02/28/2019 – Ephemeris – Looking ahead at March skies
Ephemeris for Thursday, February 28th. Today the Sun will be up for 11 hours and 6 minutes, setting at 6:28, and it will rise tomorrow at 7:20. The Moon, 2 days past last quarter, will rise at 4:38 tomorrow morning.
Let’s look at the skies of March, which will start tomorrow. During March the increase in daylight hours are at its greatest, with spring 3 weeks away. Daylight hours will increase from 11 hours and 9 minutes tomorrow to 12 hours and 42 minutes on the 31st. Along with that, the altitude of the Sun at noon will increase from 38 degrees tomorrow to 49 ½ degrees at month’s end. Local noon, by the way for Interlochen and Traverse City, is about 12:50 p.m, which is mainly due to the fact that our standard time meridian happens to run through Philadelphia. That’s before daylight time starts in eleven days. Winter ends and spring will begin at 5:58 p.m. on the 20th.
The times given are for the Traverse City/Interlochen area of Michigan. They may be different for your location.
Addenda
March Evening Star Chart

Star Chart for March 2019 (10 p.m. EDT March 15, 2019). Created using my LookingUp program. Click on image to enlarge.
The planets and stars are plotted for the 15th at 10 p.m. EST in the evening and 6 a.m. for the morning chart. These are the chart times. Note that Traverse City is located approximately 45 minutes behind our time meridian, West 75° longitude. (An hour 45 minutes behind our daylight saving time meridian during EDT). To duplicate the star positions on a planisphere you may have to set it to 1 hour 45 minutes earlier than the current time.
Note the chart times of 10 p.m. and 6 a.m. are for the 15th. For each week before the 15th add ½ hour (28 minutes if you’re picky). For each week after the 15th subtract ½ hour. The planet positions are updated each Wednesday on this blog. For planet positions on dates other than the 15th, check the Wednesday planet posts on this blog.
March Morning Star Chart

Star Chart for March mornings 2019 (6 a.m. EST March 15, 2019). Created using my LookingUp program. Click on image to enlarge.
For a list of constellation names to go with the abbreviations click here.
- Pointer stars at the front of the bowl of the Big Dipper point to Polaris the North Star.
- Follow the arc of the handle of the Big Dipper to the star Arcturus, and
- Extend like a spike to Spica,
- The Summer Triangle is in red.
Twilight Limits, Nautical and Astronomical
EST/EDT | |||||||
Morning twilight | Evening twilight | Dark night | Moon | ||||
Date | Astro. | Nautical | Nautical | Astro. | Start | End | Illum. |
2018-03-01 | 5h44m | 6h17m | 19h32m | 20h06m | – | – | 0.99 |
2018-03-02 | 5h42m | 6h16m | 19h33m | 20h07m | – | – | 1.00 |
2018-03-03 | 5h40m | 6h14m | 19h34m | 20h08m | 20h08m | 20h40m | 0.98 |
2018-03-04 | 5h38m | 6h12m | 19h36m | 20h10m | 20h10m | 21h48m | 0.93 |
2018-03-05 | 5h37m | 6h11m | 19h37m | 20h11m | 20h11m | 22h54m | 0.87 |
2018-03-06 | 5h35m | 6h09m | 19h38m | 20h12m | 20h12m | 23h57m | 0.79 |
2018-03-07 | 5h33m | 6h07m | 19h40m | 20h14m | 20h14m | – | 0.70 |
2018-03-08 | 5h31m | 6h05m | 19h41m | 20h15m | 20h15m | 0h58m | 0.60 |
2018-03-09 | 5h29m | 6h03m | 19h42m | 20h16m | 20h16m | 1h56m | 0.50 |
2018-03-10 | 5h27m | 6h02m | 19h44m | 20h18m | 20h18m | 2h50m | 0.40 |
2018-03-11 | 6h26m | 7h00m | 20h45m | 21h19m | 21h19m | 4h40m | 0.31 |
2018-03-12 | 6h24m | 6h58m | 20h46m | 21h20m | 21h20m | 5h25m | 0.22 |
2018-03-13 | 6h22m | 6h56m | 20h47m | 21h22m | 21h22m | 6h06m | 0.15 |
2018-03-14 | 6h20m | 6h54m | 20h49m | 21h23m | 21h23m | 6h20m | 0.08 |
2018-03-15 | 6h18m | 6h52m | 20h50m | 21h25m | 21h25m | 6h18m | 0.04 |
2018-03-16 | 6h16m | 6h50m | 20h51m | 21h26m | 21h26m | 6h16m | 0.01 |
2018-03-17 | 6h14m | 6h49m | 20h53m | 21h27m | 21h27m | 6h14m | 0.00 |
2018-03-18 | 6h12m | 6h47m | 20h54m | 21h29m | 21h29m | 6h12m | 0.02 |
2018-03-19 | 6h10m | 6h45m | 20h55m | 21h30m | 22h21m | 6h10m | 0.06 |
2018-03-20 | 6h12m | 6h47m | 21h01m | 21h36m | 23h30m | 6h12m | 0.12 |
2018-03-21 | 6h10m | 6h45m | 21h02m | 21h37m | – | 6h10m | 0.21 |
2018-03-22 | 6h08m | 6h43m | 21h03m | 21h39m | 0h39m | 6h08m | 0.31 |
2018-03-23 | 6h06m | 6h41m | 21h05m | 21h40m | 1h48m | 6h06m | 0.42 |
2018-03-24 | 6h03m | 6h39m | 21h06m | 21h42m | 2h54m | 6h03m | 0.54 |
2018-03-25 | 6h01m | 6h37m | 21h07m | 21h43m | 3h54m | 6h01m | 0.66 |
2018-03-26 | 5h59m | 6h35m | 21h09m | 21h45m | 4h48m | 5h59m | 0.77 |
2018-03-27 | 5h57m | 6h33m | 21h10m | 21h46m | 5h34m | 5h57m | 0.86 |
2018-03-28 | 5h55m | 6h31m | 21h12m | 21h48m | – | – | 0.93 |
2018-03-29 | 5h53m | 6h29m | 21h13m | 21h49m | – | – | 0.93 |
2018-03-30 | 5h51m | 6h27m | 21h14m | 21h51m | – | – | 0.98 |
2018-03-31 | 5h49m | 6h25m | 21h16m | 21h52m | – | – | 1.00 |
Twilight calendar was generated using Cartes du Ciel (Sky Charts).
See my blog post: Twilight Zone for the definitions of the different periods of twilight here: https://bobmoler.wordpress.com/2019/09/27/.
NASA Calendar of Planetary Events
Date | Local Time | Event | ||
Mar | 1 | Fr | 01:23 AM | Moon South Dec.: 21.6° S |
1 | Fr | Venus: 40.8° W | ||
1 | Fr | 01:40 PM | Moon-Saturn: 0.3° S | |
2 | Sa | 06:03 AM | Moon Descending Node | |
2 | Sa | 04:28 PM | Moon-Venus: 1.3° N | |
4 | Mo | 06:25 AM | Moon Apogee: 406400 km | |
6 | We | 11:04 AM | New Moon | |
6 | We | 07:48 PM | Neptune Conjunction | |
13 | We | 06:13 AM | Moon-Aldebaran: 2° S | |
14 | Th | 06:27 AM | First Quarter | |
14 | Th | 09:43 PM | Mercury Inferior Conj. | |
15 | Fr | 01:59 PM | Moon North Dec.: 21.8° N | |
16 | Sa | 12:22 PM | Moon Ascending Node | |
17 | Su | 09:01 AM | Moon-Beehive: 0.5° N | |
18 | Mo | 07:59 PM | Moon-Regulus: 2.5° S | |
19 | Tu | 03:47 PM | Moon Perigee: 359400 km | |
20 | We | 05:58 PM | Vernal Equinox | |
20 | We | 09:43 PM | Full Moon | |
26 | Tu | 10:28 PM | Moon-Jupiter: 2° S | |
28 | Th | 12:10 AM | Last Quarter | |
28 | Th | 09:02 AM | Moon South Dec.: 21.9° S | |
29 | Fr | 01:11 AM | Moon-Saturn: 0.1° N | |
29 | Fr | 09:08 AM | Moon Descending Node | |
30 | Sa | 11:08 PM | Mars-Pleiades: 3.2° S | |
31 | Su | 08:14 PM | Moon Apogee: 405600 km | |
Apr | 1 | Mo | Venus: 34.6° W |
All event times are given for UTC-5 hr: Eastern Standard or UTC-4 hr: Daylight Saving Time starting March 10th.
Sky Events Calendar by Fred Espenak and Sumit Dutta (NASA’s GSFC),
http://eclipse.gsfc.nasa.gov/SKYCAL/SKYCAL.html.
If you go to the above site you can print out a list like the above for the entire year or calendar pages for your time zone.
Sun and Moon Rising and Setting Events
Ephemeris of Sky Events for NMC Observatory | ||||||||||
March, 2019 – Local time zone: EST | ||||||||||
Sun | Twilight* | Moon | Illum | |||||||
Date | Rise | Set | Hours | End | Start | Phase | R/S** | Time | Fractn | |
Fri | 1 | 07:20a | 06:30a | 11:09 | 07:33p | 06:17a | Rise | 05:22a | 18 | |
Sat | 2 | 07:18a | 06:31p | 11:12 | 07:34p | 06:15a | Rise | 06:02a | 12 | |
Sun | 3 | 07:16a | 06:32p | 11:15 | 07:35p | 06:13a | Rise | 06:36a | 6 | |
Mon | 4 | 07:15a | 06:34p | 11:18 | 07:36p | 06:12a | Rise | 07:06a | 3 | |
Tue | 5 | 07:13a | 06:35p | 11:22 | 07:38p | 06:10a | Rise | 07:33a | 0 | |
Wed | 6 | 07:11a | 06:36p | 11:25 | 07:39p | 06:08a | New | Set | 06:41p | 0 |
Thu | 7 | 07:09a | 06:37p | 11:28 | 07:40p | 06:06a | Set | 07:41p | 2 | |
Fri | 8 | 07:07a | 06:39p | 11:31 | 07:42p | 06:05a | Set | 08:43p | 5 | |
Sat | 9 | 07:06a | 06:40p | 11:34 | 07:43p | 06:03a | Set | 09:45p | 10 | |
*** Start EDT *** | ||||||||||
Sun | 10 | 08:04a | 07:41p | 11:37 | 08:44p | 07:01a | Set | 11:49p | 17 | |
Mon | 11 | 08:02a | 07:43p | 11:40 | 08:46p | 06:59a | Set | 12:54a | 25 | |
Tue | 12 | 08:00a | 07:44p | 11:43 | 08:47p | 06:57a | Set | 02:00a | 35 | |
Wed | 13 | 07:58a | 07:45p | 11:46 | 08:48p | 06:56a | Set | 03:05a | 45 | |
Thu | 14 | 07:57a | 07:47p | 11:49 | 08:50p | 06:54a | F Qtr | Set | 04:08a | 56 |
Fri | 15 | 07:55a | 07:48p | 11:53 | 08:51p | 06:52a | Set | 05:06a | 67 | |
Sat | 16 | 07:53a | 07:49p | 11:56 | 08:52p | 06:50a | Set | 05:58a | 77 | |
Sun | 17 | 07:51a | 07:50p | 11:59 | 08:53p | 06:48a | Set | 06:42a | 87 | |
Mon | 18 | 07:49a | 07:52p | 12:02 | 08:55p | 06:46a | Set | 07:21a | 94 | |
Tue | 19 | 07:47a | 07:53p | 12:05 | 08:56p | 06:44a | Set | 07:54a | 98 | |
Wed | 20 | 07:46a | 07:54p | 12:08 | 08:57p | 06:42a | Full | Rise | 07:35p | 100 |
Thu | 21 | 07:44a | 07:55p | 12:11 | 08:59p | 06:40a | Rise | 08:52p | 99 | |
Fri | 22 | 07:42a | 07:57p | 12:14 | 09:00p | 06:39a | Rise | 10:07p | 95 | |
Sat | 23 | 07:40a | 07:58p | 12:18 | 09:02p | 06:37a | Rise | 11:20p | 88 | |
Sun | 24 | 07:38a | 07:59p | 12:21 | 09:03p | 06:35a | Rise | 12:30a | 80 | |
Mon | 25 | 07:36a | 08:00p | 12:24 | 09:04p | 06:33a | Rise | 01:36a | 71 | |
Tue | 26 | 07:34a | 08:02p | 12:27 | 09:06p | 06:31a | Rise | 02:37a | 62 | |
Wed | 27 | 07:33a | 08:03p | 12:30 | 09:07p | 06:29a | Rise | 03:32a | 52 | |
Thu | 28 | 07:31a | 08:04p | 12:33 | 09:08p | 06:27a | L Qtr | Rise | 04:20a | 42 |
Fri | 29 | 07:29a | 08:05p | 12:36 | 09:10p | 06:25a | Rise | 05:02a | 33 | |
Sat | 30 | 07:27a | 08:07p | 12:39 | 09:11p | 06:23a | Rise | 05:38a | 24 | |
Sun | 31 | 07:25a | 08:08p | 12:42 | 09:12p | 06:21a | Rise | 06:09a | 17 |
* Nautical Twilight
** Moonrise or moonset, whichever occurs between sunset and sunrise
Created using my LookingUp for DOS output as CSV.