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Astronomical Observing at Fishcreek - Friday 10/12/2007

Tonight's event will feature a Moonless sky all night since it sets at 7:13pm this evening.  We'll have the planet Jupiter, colorful double stars, open clusters made up of hundreds of stars, globular clusters comprised of hundreds of thousands of stars, planetary nebula formed by dying stars, diffuse nebula and emission nebula where stars are being born, will all be available to us the entire night.  Many amateur astronomers feel that late fall is the best time to observe since there are beautiful objects of all categories available and the Milky Way, the galaxy in which we live, is directly overhead.

for a list of DeepSky Objects that will be available to us this session.

We hope to see you here for a night under the stars - now in our thirteenth year!

For observing conditions at our site, please click on the link below: 
ClearSkyClock for Fishcreek Site  (the darker blue the squares are, the better)

Quick links:
    Inner Solar System     Outer Solar System    General Information about our events

Moon data   Rises: 8: 59am Transits: 2: 10pm - Time of highest position in the sky, due South Sets: 7: 13pm Constellation:   Virgo Phase:   2.94% illuminated (waxing crescent) Distance:   0.0027221 AU = 407,221 km = 253,035 miles = 1.36 light-seconds Magnitude:   -5.1 Apparent size:   29.33 arcminutes in angular diameter Elongation from Sun:   19.69 degrees (evening sky) Age:   1.78 days since last New Moon Next Phase:   First Quarter Moon on Friday Oct 19, 2007 at 4:33am Next Lunar eclipse:   Total eclipse (100%) on Wednesday Feb 20, 2008 at 9:58pm EST At 7:50pm the Moon will be 7.6° below the west-southwest horizon but will look like this before it sets at 7:13pm: (back to 'Quick Links')

Jupiter data   Rises: 12: 19pm Transits: 5: 01pm - Time of highest position in the sky, due South Sets: 9: 43pm Constellation:   Ophiuchus (pronounced oh-fee-oo'-cuss) Phase:   99.37% illuminated Distance:   5.75519008 AU = 860,964,182 km = 534,978,347 miles = 47.94 light-minutes Magnitude:   -1.9 Apparent size:   34.26 arcseconds in angular diameter Elongation from Sun:   56.85 degrees (evening sky) At 7:50pm Jupiter will be 15.4º above the south-southwest horizon Next transit of the Great Red Spot:  Saturday Oct 13, 2007 at 00:05am GRS longitude: 117.6º Jupiter satellite events tonight:       Io Transit starts at 8:10pm       Io Shadow Transit starts at 9:14pm       Europa comes out of eclipse at 9:15pm       Io Transit ends at 10:22pm (but Jupiter will have already set)       Io Shadow Transit ends at 11:26pm (but Jupiter will have already set) This animated GIF of Jupiter and its four moons begins at 7:00pm EDT and runs until Jupiter is below the horizon.  You can read the altitude and azimuth in the caption below Jupiter.  This image is neither inverted nor reversed and will look like this in binoculars or a non-inverting telescope.  Frames are 15 minutes apart. 'Alt' is degrees above the horizon, 'Az' is degrees of azimuth: 0 is north, 90 is east, 180 is south and 270 is west → Callisto is off-screen to the right The apparent eastward (left) motion of Jupiter and its moons relative to the background stars is due to the combined motion of Jupiter and Earth in their orbits around the Sun. (back to 'Quick Links')

Inner Solar System - the Sun, Mercury, Venus and Earth
(Created using Software Bisque's TheSky software)

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Outer Solar System - the Sun, Mars, Jupiter, Uranus, Neptune and Pluto
(Created using Software Bisque's TheSky software)

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General Information you should know about our events - Q&A of Where, When and What

Very sincerely yours,
Dave Jessie
"Time spent observing the heavens is not deducted from your life span"

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