05/25/2020 – Ephemeris – Comet SWAN is in our skies in evening twilight

When I recorded this program on the evening of the17th there was hope that Comet SWAN would have achieved naked-eye visibility.  It did earlier this month when it was too far south for us to see from 45° North latitude.  Predictions now are for it to be 7th magnitude, 2.5 times dimmer than the faintest star visible to the unaided eye.

This is Ephemeris for Memorial Day, Monday, May 25th. Today the Sun will be up for 15 hours and 10 minutes, setting at 9:15, and it will rise tomorrow at 6:03. The Moon, 3 days past new, will set at 12:18 tomorrow morning.

Comet SWAN just might be visible in binoculars tonight by about 10:30 p.m. with binoculars or a small telescope low in the northwestern sky. A pointer to it is the bright star Capella also in that direction. Comet SWAN will be located in the direction of 4 o’clock (to the right and a bit down) by 10 degrees angle, the width of your fist held at arms length. It will be a small fuzzy spot. I doubt you would spot the comet’s tail. It is a thin ion or gaseous tail that is revealed in photographs only. Over the next week it will be moving toward Capella and on June 1st will be just below Capella but half as bright as it is now. There’s another comet coming. Comet NeoWISE will be visible in our skies by late July if it holds up.

The event times given are for the Traverse City/Interlochen area of Michigan. They may be different for your location.

Addenda

Comet SWAN

Comet SWAN track against the stars for 10 pm May 25 to June 3, 2020 with Mercury and Venus for the 25th They will be moving too. Comet labels show month-day and magnitude. However add 4 to the magnitude to get the approximate actual magnitude. The comet would be hard to spot in binoculars even in a dark sky. But who knows, the comet might flare up and be visible. Created using Cartes du Ciel (Sky Charts).

Northwestern horizon tonight at 10 pm May 25, 2020 with a scale that’s close to that of the image above. The comet is not bright enough to show here. Created using Stellarium.

In Memoriam

Today as we prepare to send humans into space from American soil for the first time in 9 years we pause to remember those who gave their lives for our country.  For purposes of this program that includes those courageous enough to sit on top of or beside a million pounds of explosives to be launched into space.  From the three astronauts who died in the Apollo one file in 1967, the explosion of the Space Shuttle Challenger in 1986, to the disintegration of the Columbia in 2003, 17 Americans and other nationals have died in NASA space accidents.  The Russians too have lost cosmonauts in the exploration of space.  Brothers and sisters in the quest for knowledge and to expand the horizons of human habitation.  Per aspera, ad astra,  Through difficulties to the stars!

A listing of Astronaut and Cosmonaut deaths:  http://www.aerospaceweb.org/question/history/q0114.shtml

The Vatican Observatory Calendar

Being Catholic, I occasionally check the Vatican Observatory Foundation website. Besides the director of the Vatican Observatory is Brother Guy Consolmagno SJ, a fellow Michigander, born in Detroit. There were a couple of items on the May calendar that caught my eye.

Today, was marked as Memorial Day, but also Towel Day.  Towel Day? It’s the 42nd anniversary of the first BBC Radio broadcast of Douglas Adams’ Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy. And if you don’t know the significance of a towel or the number 42, I won’t spoil it for you.

Also May 15th was the 300th birthday of Maximilian Hell SJ, first director of the Vienna Observatory, who also observed the transit of Venus in1769 from northern Norway. The crater on the Moon Hell is named for him.  I’ve always had fun showing the crater a day or two after first quarter and mentioning that the crater Hell is named after a priest.

05/29/2017 – Ephemeris – We remember too those who died reaching for the stars

Ephemeris for Memorial Day, Monday, May 29th.  Today the Sun will be up for 15 hours and 16 minutes, setting at 9:18, and it will rise tomorrow at 6:01.  The Moon, 3 days before first quarter, will set at 1:04 tomorrow morning.

Today we pause to remember those who gave their lives for our country.  For purposes of this program that includes those courageous enough to sit on top of or beside a million pounds of explosives to be launched into space.  From the three astronauts who died in the Apollo one file in 1967, the explosion of the Space Shuttle Challenger in 1986, to the disintegration of the Columbia in 2003, 17 Americans and other nationals have died in NASA space accidents.  The Russians too have lost cosmonauts in the exploration of space.  Brothers and sisters in the quest for knowledge and to expand the horizons of human habitation.  Per aspera, ad astra,  Through difficulties to the stars!

The times given are for the Traverse City/Interlochen area of Michigan. They may be different for your location.

Addendum

A listing of Astronaut and Cosmonaut deaths:  http://www.aerospaceweb.org/question/history/q0114.shtml

05/26/2014 – Ephemeris – In memory of the fallen Space Shuttle Astronauts

Ephemeris for Memorial Day, Monday, May 26th.  Today the sun will be up for 15 hours and 10 minutes, setting at 9:15.   The moon, 2 days before new, will rise at 5:29 tomorrow morning.  Tomorrow the sun will rise at 6:03.

Memorial day is a day of remembrance for those who paid the ultimate price for our freedom.  When astronomers name craters or other features on planets or moons, they are names of those who have gone before.  For instance craters near the moon’s north and south poles are named for explorers of the corresponding earthly pole.  The Challenger astronauts have craters named for them in the moon system of Uranus, from discovery pictures relayed to the earth by Voyager 2 a few days before the Challenger accident.  The Mars Rover Spirit is a memorial and located in the Columbia Hills, its features named for the astronauts who died 11 months before Spirit landed.

Times are for the Traverse City/Interlochen area of Michigan.  They may be different for your location.

Addendum

The Challenger crew. From the left: Ellison Onizuka, Michael Smith, Christa McAuliffe, Dick Scobee, Gregory Jarvis, Judith Resnick, and Ronald McNair. Credit: NASA

The Columbia crew. From the left: Mission Specialist David Brown, Commander Rick Husband, Mission Specialists Laurel Clark, Kalpana Chawla and Michael Anderson, Pilot William McCool and Payload Specialist Ilan Ramon. Credit: NASA.

I was remiss in my program to omit the Apollo 1 crew.

The Apollo 1 crew. From the left: Ed White, Gus Grissom, and Roger Chaffee. Credit: NASA

Apollo 1 never flew.  A spark and the faulty design of the spacecraft doomed the men during a test on the pad.  Roger Chaffee, from my home town of Grand Rapids, MI was the rookie and had never flown in space.  They are immortalized with craters on the far side of the moon.

For more  information check out Amy Shira Teitel’s excellent article in Universe Today.