Skynotes January 2012

Month Highlights

With the two bright planets Venus and Jupiter in the evening sky and three planets Mercury, Mars and Saturn in the morning sky, it doesn’t matter if you are an early riser or a night owl - January is a great month for spotting planets.

Summer School Holidays

Scienceworks will be opened daily from 10am–4:30pm during school holidays (26th December – 5th February). Planetarium session times are:

12pm: Tycho to the Moon – meet Tycho, a dog who doesn’t just howl at the Moon but wants to go there!

1pm: Stories in the Stars: the night sky of the Boorong people – see Victorian constellations come to life

2pm: Tilt – discover the reasons for seasons

3pm: Black Holes: Journey into the Unknown – a place where the unimaginable becomes reality

See the Melbourne Planetarium's What's On listing for more details.

Fulldome Fridays – coming this February

We have an exciting and completely different program coming up in February. Each Friday evening we will be screening the most innovative and artistic films designed specifically for the domed screen. Fulldome Fridays will let you experience these immersive new works, where the screen above seemingly disappears.

Discover the Night Sky – coming this March

Melbourne Planetarium presents its popular astronomy evenings, each Thursday in March. Immerse yourself in the stars of the Melbourne Planetarium, enjoy a glass of wine with cheese, and discover a new mystery of the night sky.

Sunrise & Sunset Times

Moon Phases

The Moon will be at apogee (furthest from Earth) on Tuesday 3rd and Tuesday 31st at distances of 404 588 km and 404 325 km respectively.

The Moon will be at perigee (closest to Earth) on Wednesday 18th at a distance of 369 899 km.

Let the Moon be Your Guide

The Moon can be used as a pointer to find other objects in the sky:

• The waxing gibbous Moon sits below Jupiter on the evenings of the 2nd and 3rd.
• On the 5th the Moon is just above the star cluster Pleiades in the northern sky.
• The waning gibbous Moon, just past full, sits in a line with the twin stars of Gemini, Castor and Pollux, but a bit further away in the sky, on the night of the 10th.
• On the night of the 12th the Moon is near the bright star Regulus (Leo).
• The Moon sits close to the planet Mars late on the 13th and into the morning of the 14th.
• During the early hours of the 17th, the last quarter Moon makes a neat grouping with the planet Saturn and above them the bright star Spica (Virgo).
• Before dawn on the 20th the thin crescent Moon is below the red supergiant star Antares (Scorpius).
• On the evening of the 26th the waxing crescent Moon will sit below brilliant Venus above the western horizon making a beautiful sight in the evening sky.
• On the 30th the Moon will again sit near Jupiter in the evening sky.

Planets

Mercury can be seen low to the eastern horizon before sunrise at the beginning of January. The best time to look for Mercury is in the first two weeks – by the end of January Mercury is getting lost in the glare from the Sun.

Venus is the brilliant evening star and grows slowly brighter throughout the month. On the 26th the Moon, just a few days past new, sits below the bright planet in the evening.

Earth will be at perihelion (closest approach to the Sun) on Thursday 5th, at a distance of 147 million km from the Sun.  However, this is not the reason behind our summer warmth. The seasons are caused by the Earth’s axial tilt. During summer, Australia is tilted towards the Sun, causing the Sun to appear high in the sky and lengthening our days. The Sun’s light also increases in intensity because it hits our part of the Earth more directly.

Mars is rising just after midnight at the beginning of the month and can be seen in the sky throughout the morning hours. It rises earlier through the month and by the end of January is rising before midnight.

Jupiter is high in the northern sky after sunset. On the nights of the 2nd and 3rd, and then again on the 30th the Moon is near Jupiter.

Saturn is rising around two hours after Mars and is also seen in the morning sky throughout the month. Saturn is sitting close to Spica, the brightest star in Virgo throughout January. Before dawn on the 17th, the Moon makes a neat triangle with Spica and Saturn.

Meteors

The year starts slowly for meteor showers. The month’s most active shower, the Quadrantids, is a strong Northern Hemisphere shower. Sometimes it is possible to spot some long-pathed meteors around the peak of the shower on the 4th.

The shower best suited for viewing in the Southern Hemisphere is the Eta Carinids which is active from 14th to 27th. The meteors are typically faint, with hourly rates of only 2 or 3 at the shower’s peak around the 21st. The shower is centred near the faint star Eta Carina, which is one of the most massive stars in our Galaxy. Eta Carina is found near the Southern Cross and is high in the south from midnight to dawn, the ideal time for meteor observing.

Stars and Constellations

Orion, the hunter, is now high in the north-eastern sky and easily located by the three bright stars that form his belt. In Australia, we recognise the belt as the base of the Saucepan. The handle of the Saucepan (also known as the sword of Orion) contains a spectacular nebula that is a birthplace of new stars. This cloud of glowing gas is 1,500 light-years away but is still easily visible through binoculars. Above the Saucepan is the blue-white supergiant star Rigel and below is the red supergiant star Betelgeuse.

On the western side of Orion is the hunter’s prey Taurus, the bull. A small triangle depicts the face of the bull with the brightest star in the group being the red giant, Aldebaran. Aldebaran sits in front of a widely spread cluster of about 200 stars called the Hyades. Taurus also contains a second cluster, the Pleiades (or Seven Sisters), which is the brightest and most famous star cluster in the sky. Approximately seven stars can be seen with the naked eye but binoculars reveal many more.

The Southern Cross and the Two Pointers are low in the south-east, which means that the Magellanic Clouds, two of our nearest galaxies, are high in the sky. They sit opposite the Southern Cross and away from city lights, they appear as two fuzzy patches or ‘clouds’.

International Space Station

The ISS orbits the Earth every 90 minutes at an average distance of 400 km. The ISS appears as a bright star that steadily moves across the sky. It can often be seen from Melbourne, for example at:

9:23pm – 9:26pm and 10:57pm – 11:04pm, Sunday 8th January.

In the first pass the Station will appear above the northern horizon and travel low above the north eastern horizon. In the second pass the Station will appear above the north-west horizon and will travel higher in the sky passing directly through the constellation of the Southern Cross before disappearing in the south-east.

Predictions of when to see the ISS can be obtained from the website: www.heavens-above.com

On this Day

1st 1801, the first asteroid, Ceres, was discovered by Giuseppi Piazzi (Italy).

2nd 1839, Louis Daguerre (France) takes the first photograph of the Moon.

2nd 1959, Luna 1 (USSR) was launched and became the first spacecraft to fly by the Moon and orbit the Sun.

4th 1958, the first satellite, Sputnik (USSR), fell back into the atmosphere and disintegrated.

5th 1972, the Space Shuttle (USA) program was launched.

6th 1892, an aurora was first photographed.

7th 1610, Galileo Galilei discovered the Jupiter's four largest moons: Io, Europa, Callisto and Ganymede.

9th 1839, Thomas Henderson (South Africa) is the first person to measure the distance to a star other than the Sun, Alpha Centauri.

9th 1998, an international team including Australians announces the discovery that the expansion of the Universe is accelerating.

10th 1946, the US Army Corps bounce a radar signal off the Moon, showing that radio waves could penetrate the atmosphere.

11th 1787, Sir William Herschel discovered the first moon of Uranus.

22nd 1997, Lottie Williams (USA) becomes the only person known to have been hit by space junk when she is struck in the shoulder by a piece of metal, believed to have been part of a Delta II rocket.

24th 1986, Voyager 2 (USA) made the first flyby of Uranus and sent back close-up pictures of the planet.

27th 1967, the Apollo 1 (USA) fire kills crew of 3.

28th 1986, the space shuttle Challenger (USA) explodes after lift-off killing all seven crew members.

31st 1958, Explorer 1, was the first USA satellite launched.