Mercury Again.

Well if you didn’t catch Mercury last week when it was on top of Jupiter, this week it’s at his highest above the western horizon, to night is its highest point. Mercury will be quite a bit higher than Jupiter until the weekend when it will rapidly fall into the horizon, Mercury does rather flip around, this is because it’s so close the sun and has an 88 day year, so by the time we get to mid summer’s day it will be back where it is now.

Venus shines low in the southeast during dawn, lower each week, you can still see it, unless Dean was lying, he claimed to have seen over Peninis last week, I wouldn’t know the planet of love sets at least 4 hours before I get up at the moment. But Venus is getting closer to the Sun all the time and will soon disappear.

This is all getting a bit sad because we are about to say goodbye to Jupiter as well it’s very low in the west and not easily seen. But if you haven’t a enough of it since September All you need is a clear evening and a viewing site with an good view down to the west horizon.  Note the spot where the Sun sets, wait another 15 minutes, and then start scanning above that spot for Jupiter and Mercury. Mercury is still about 12° — two binocular fields — above the horizon a half hour after sunset.

But they will all come back, in fact Venus, Mars and Jupiter all rise around 5 am on the 16^th of May and a week later Mercury joins them, so set your alarms.

And of course Mars is still out of sight behind the glare of the Sun.

Saturn rises around 8 p.m. It's highest in the south around 1 a.m. daylight saving time. Spica, slightly fainter, shines about 10° below Saturn all evening.

There is something else we can look out for, these next two weeks, when there's no moonlight in the sky at the end of twilight, are a chipper time to look for the zodiacal light. As the last of twilight is fading away, look for a vague but huge, tall, narrow pyramid of pearly light extending up from the western horizon. It slopes to the left, following the ecliptic. What you're seeing is interplanetary dust near the plane of the solar system, lit by the Sun.

That was your night sky for the week ending 1974^th anniversary of Caligula accepting the titles of the Principate, entitled to him by the Senate. He was initially reluctant to accept but his horse said he would have to sleep on the sofa if he didn’t, so he did.

Mercury Jupiter Conjunction.

This week for the first time for months we actually have something happen, a good conjunction, tonight mercury is within 2 degrees of Jupiter, pretty well due west at sunset. Sadly there’s not a huge amount of time to catch them, it should be dark enough to catch Jupiter soon after 7 it’s still pretty bright, though its about as far away from us as it gets at the moment, so find Jupiter first and Mercury which will be much dimmer, but will be right on top of the giant planet, and by 7:45 they’ve both set. But it’s the best chance to see Mercury this year. Because they are both so low western horizon you will need a pretty good low view of the western horizon, at least on St Mary’s because the accursed garrison will be in the way. As usual binoculars will help, you’ll certainly see Jupiter as a disc and maybe some of the Jovian moons, and if you’re prepared to use a little imagination you may see Mercury as a crescent. Mercury will be within 5 degrees of Jupiter right up until Friday. There’s a guide on the blog.

The other highlight happens next Sunday at 23:21, when the sun edges north over the equator and spring starts.

We still have Venus which rises around 6:30 in the South East followed very quickly by the sun, so it’s not what it was.

Saturn rises at around 9 again in the SE it’s quite easy to find before midnight look to the SE where you’ll see two similarly bright stars, Saturn is the upper of the two and Spica is the other, now here’s a load of exciting padding about Spica, it’s the brightest star in the in Virgo, and the 15th brightest star in the sky. It is 260 light years distant from Earth. A blue giant, it is a variable of the Beta Cepheid type, so now you know.

The other highlight happens next Sunday at 23:21, when the sun edges north over the equator and spring starts, and our hour goes forward a week on Saturday, hough as usual the Americans got in first.

And it seems that daylight saving came in at 2am on Saturday in most of the US and Canada, though in Arizona Hawaii Puerto Rico, Virgin Islands, Guam, and American Samoa they don’t bother, and stay on standard time all year.  Though when I say Arizona, I’m obviously excluding that part of the state which is under the jurisdiction of the Navajo Nation, which isn’t just Navajo being petulant and a little cussed, it’s probably because the Navajo nation straddles Utah, Colorado and New Mexico as well, which would make it even more confusing. That was more padding by the way.

And that was your night’s sky for the week ending on 167th anniversary of the original date predicted by William Miller for the return of Christ. Of course he may well have turned up but people thought he was a bit of a nutter as you would and largely ignored him, but probably William Miller was wrong

The Slough Of Despond

The Crab Nebula 

The sky a seems to have sunk into a Slough of Despond at the moment, which is of course is a deep bog in John Bunyan's, The Pilgrim's Progress, into which the character Christian sinks under the weight of his sins and his sense of guilt for them, not that you should necessarily do this, but that is of course between you and your conscience. There really is nothing much happening, and certainly not before midnight.

So in the absence of any planets in the evening star, except of course a setting Jupiter, and with the waning moon rising later all the time, it may be a good time to look for some deeper sky objects. There’s the winter star cluster M41, visible in binoculars about one binocular field south of Sirius, It contains about 100 stars including several red giants, Its age is estimated at between 190 and 240 million years old. So compared to the Sun, its stars are still in nappies.

You could also like between the horns of Taurus? Taurus is easily spotted just above Orion, the horns sweeping backward from Aldebaran, the bulls baleful red eye. You should see a hazy smudge which is the Crab Nebula.

And then there’s the Andromeda galaxy around half way between Cassiopeia and Pegasus. There’s a link below if you want to have a go.

 

Finding Andromeda.

As for the planets Mercury, Mars, and Neptune are hidden behind the glare of the Sun. But Venus is still there shining brightly in Sagittarius) shines as the "Morning Star" in the southeast just before and during dawn.

Jupiter shines brightly in the west at dusk and sets roughly an hour after dark now. But by 8:45 the giant planet has set.

Saturn rises at 10p.m., in the south east, you may get a glimpse of the rings in binoculars, and they’re at a reasonable angle to us now.

Uranus is a bout 7° west (lower right) of Jupiter and disappearing into the evening twilight. And it’s easier to see with the naked eye now as it moves away from Jupiter’s glare, but it’s very dim.

On that was your nights sky for the week ending on the 72^nd anniversary of the erroneous word "Dord" being discovered in the Webster's New International Dictionary, Second Edition, prompting an investigation. It seems it was submitted as capital D or d as an abbreviation for density but through a shameful example of howling ineptitude it went in as Dord, which is fascinating.  

150 today.

This weeks Scilly Stars is a very special one, hence the fanfare, it’s the 150^th, which seems rather a lot to me, and it is it’s about 7 and a half hours, and I’ve got all of them. So if anybody wants copies I can just squeeze them onto 6 cds, but do bear in mind I’m not anticipating a huge take up on that offer, even if it were free, which its not. Anyway because it’s so special this Scilly Stars is like the radio equivalent of the end of the Christmas 2 Ronnies, I only wish you could see all the hoopla, suffice to say I'm recording this week’s in a gold lame jacket wearing a very fetching Liberace toupee. I also, in a dream, asked god if he would make a guest appearance, but was told no, because it seems it would have upset Alan Bookbinder, the previous head of religious programming at the BBC, but that was only a dream and maybe Mr Bookbinder wouldn't have minded, but we’ll never know. But in the end I dad manage to get a celebrity, Dieter Markus Stein who holds the record for landing the worlds biggest, but sadly Mr Stein couldn't speak English very well so I dropped him.

 This is a picture of the largest common carp in the world - a colossal record-breaking beast weighing in at 85lb 9oz. It was taken by German ace Dieter Markus Stein from a top-secret stillwater in his homeland, a venue which is regarded as one of the hardest lakes on the Continent where the gap between bites can sometimes run into months

Now sadly for such a special occasion, there is very little going on up there this week, in fact it’s almost the same as last week.

No Mercury and no Mars, in fact no Mars until the summer. But we have the other 3, 4 if you include Uranus, which seems reasonable.

Venus, still a very bright –4.3 blazes as the "Morning Star" in the southeast before and during dawn.

A bright but dimming Jupiter, which is now moving toward the other side of the sun, shines brightly in the southwest as the stars come out; it sinks lower later. We only have Jupiter for another couple of months, by the of March it will be setting with the sun.

Saturn a lot dimmer than Jupiter rises around 11 p.m, and is best ssen due south in the early hours before dawn.

Uranus is naked eye visible, but only just, is about 4° west of Jupiter and pulling away from it.

But anyway its to cold to look anyway, I did try at the weekend and after 45 seconds I surrendered then scurried back in doors with a hacking cough more dead than alive.

And that was you 150^th Scilly Stars for the week ending on the 216^th anniversary of the ratification of The 11th Amendment to the US Constitution.

And if the 11 amendment has slipped your mind here it is.

The Judicial power of the United States shall not be construed to extend to any suit in law or equity, commenced or prosecuted against one of the United States by Citizens of another State, or by Citizens or Subjects of any Foreign State.