A guest sat at the end of the dock for quite some time last Friday night; only to later to point out that the view of the stars and Milky Way were just amazing in the clear skies over Lake Santeetlah.
It seems that with the moon’s disappearance from the evening sky means that it’s a great time to take advantage of prime fall observing weather. We still have summer’s bright star patterns and the magnificent star clouds of the Milky Way to enjoy in the early evening. Astronomical twilight now ends well before 8:30 pm, and as it fades the stars of the Summer Triangle are passing directly overhead. In the south and southwestern sky the densest star clouds of the Galaxy linger and traces of the river of amorphous light overhead and down to the northeast horizon, panning the view for star clusters and bright knots of nebulosity. By 10:00 pm the fainter stars of autumn begin to invade the south and southeastern sky, while off to the east you’ll see one of the fall’s more distinctive star patterns climbing high. As the Summer Triangle passes west of the meridian, four second-magnitude stars rise to meet it. These stars form an asterism known as the “Great Square” and are part of the constellation of Pegasus, the flying horse of the Perseus and Andromeda myth. All of the characters of this celestial play are located in the northeastern sky at this hour, and as the night moves toward midnight Andromeda, Cassiopeia, Cepheus, and Perseus all climb higher to displace summer’s setting patterns. This part of the sky is a deep-sky observer’s dream, loaded with bright star clusters in the Milky Way and faint galaxies far beyond.
Early evening twilight still offers a chance to see the bright dazzle of Venus in the southwestern sky, but her time to shine in relative prominence is about to end in a big hurry. Look for her shortly after sunset a few degrees above the horizon. On a clear night she should be relatively easy to spot about 20 minutes after sunset. .
Jupiter now dominates the evening and overnight hours, virtually unrivalled by any other object except the Moon. Old Jove is just a week past his closest opposition in nearly 40 years and stands out like a beacon in the star-poor reaches of the autumnal constellations. The giant planet and his ever-changing bright cloud belts and dark zones offer a different palate for viewing every night. It seems as though there’s always something interesting going on out there!