27-01-2007 February night sky (Article 70)

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Simon Kenny
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Joined: Tue Feb 12, 2008 9:17 pm
Location: Shannon, Co. Clare, Ireland

27-01-2007 February night sky (Article 70)

Post by Simon Kenny » Wed Feb 04, 2009 10:36 am

February night sky (Article 70)

Since last summer opportunities to even casually observe the night sky from the Mid-West have been few because of cloud cover. Those of you who regularly note the positions of individual stars or constellations will have spotted that they are on show about 2 hours earlier since last month. You have now observed how much Earth has travelled in its orbit around the Sun.
In the NW, the familiar W-shape of Cassiopeia and neighbouring Perseus are easy to find. Orion the Hunter and its retinue have shifted west. The Plough hangs upside down in the northern sky and this orientation makes it look like a gigantic question mark. Due south lies the brightest star seen in our sky, Sirius, in the constellation Canis Major, and best seen this month. In the east Leo heralds the rapid approach of Spring.

Regarding the nearer planets, both Venus and Mercury can be seen near the horizon between SW and W just after sunset from 1st Feb. Venus will be very bright and Mercury lies between Venus and the Sun. From mid month Mercury will move too near to the Sun (from Earth’s viewpoint) to be visible. (Warning: do not use a telescope or binoculars with the Sun above the horizon — instant blindness will occur). On the 19th Feb. at about 6:00pm Venus will lie on the lower cusp of a very thin crescent of the Moon and will look like the image below.
Jupiter rises at 3:45am on 2 Feb in SE and Saturn rises at 17:30pm between NE and E and by mid month will be well up between E and SE. Mars rises at 6:00am on 2 Feb in SE and even by 28 Feb is still barely above the horizon in a bright sky.

On 2 Feb at 17:32 pm the Moon appears to be “sitting” on Saturn just above the NNE horizon and to its left lies the head of the lion in the constellation Leo. During the evening the Moon will pass very close to Saturn and come very close to occulting the planet. So, if you have had difficulty finding Saturn in the night sky here is a chance to easily locate its position. This is a line of sight phenomenon as viewed from Earth. When this happens the Moon will be 0.28 million miles from Earth compared to Saturn’s distance of 768million miles!

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