Messier 101 also known as the Pinwheel Galaxy and NGC 5457 is a large, face-on spiral galaxy in Ursa Major near the Big Dipper’s handle tip star, Alkaid. This Sloan digital Sky Survey image spans about 25 arc-minutes top to bottom – or about the diameter of the full moon. In June the galaxy is…
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The prominent galaxies Messier 81 or Bode’s Nebula (left) and Messier 82 or the Cigar Galaxy (right) are located near the Big Dipper’s bowl in the northern sky. This image by AstroDoc Ron Brecher of Guelph, Ontario from February, 2017 spans about 1.5 degrees, or three full moon diameters. Messier 81 is large and bright…
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This full disk image of the sun on April 23, 2021 was taken by Dave Hoskins. This view shows the sun through a special solar telescope that uses the Hydrogen-alpha wavelength in the red part of the visible spectrum. A large group of small sunspots sits just to the lower left of centre, surrounded by…
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This annotated image of the Lyrids Meteor Shower was captured by Petr Horalek when the Lyrids streaked over Seč Lake in the Czech Republic in April, 2020. The meteors appear to radiate from a point in the sky in Hercules near the very bright blue star Vega of Lyra (the Harp). Don’t watch the radiant…
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This amazing composite photo by my friend Bill Longo has it all! The arc of the International Space Station crossing the sky, the green glow of the Aurora Borealis, the northern Summer Milky Way, and numerous Perseids meteors! Hello, Spring Stargazers! Here are your Astronomy Skylights for the week of April 11th, 2021 by Chris…
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This beautiful photo of the Aurora Borealis was captured by my friend Yvonne Wong in Alaska recently. The aurorae are more frequent around the two equinox periods each year because the N-S component of the Earth’s magnetic field is reduced and less able to fend off the solar wind. Hello, Spring Stargazers! Here are your…
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This image of the waxing crescent moon was taken by Michael Watson of Toronto on March 2, 2014. It nicely shows the Earthshine phenomenon, and the way the position of the lit crescent on the young moon at this time of year resembles the Cheshire Cat’s smile. Michael’s gallery of images are hosted on his…
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As shown above, on Saturday, March 20 from 8:39 to 8:44 pm EDT, the International Space Station will fly high overhead of the GTA in an extremely bright pass, rising from the west-southwestern horizon, flying closely past Mars and then through the bowl of the Big Dipper, and then disappearing into Earth’s shadow over the…
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This spectacular image by Petr Horalek od Institute of Physics in Opava shows reddish Mars (bottom centre) just below the blue Pleiades star cluster on March 3, 2021, and Mars’ “twin”, the reddish star Aldebaran above the “V” of Taurus at lower left. The red streak at the upper right is the California Nebula in…
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This gorgeous image of the region of sky between Taurus’ triangular face and the bright orange star Aldebaran and the blue Pleiades star Cluster was taken by Amir H. Abolfath using his Canon EOS6D camera on a Star Adventurer mount. It covers a span of sky of about 19 degrees (two fist diameters) top-to-bottom, and…
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