The glorious face-on spiral galaxy Messier 101, also known as the Pinwheel Galaxy, is located near the bright star Alkaid, at the tip of the Big Dipper’s handle. Visible even in binoculars, it is nearly overhead on April evenings. (Deep Sky Survey image from Stellarium) Hello, mid-April Stargazers! Here are your Astronomy Skylights for the…
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The western portion of the moon is largely covered by the dark Oceanus Procellarum. Major craters Copernicus and Kepler are surrounded by blankets of ejecta and ray systems. Under magnification, look for small craters with dark haloes around Copernicus. The Reiner Gamma Swirl and Aristarchus regions are interesting, too. Hello, April Stargazers! Here are your…
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The Open cluster Messier 35, also known as the Shoe-Buckle Cluster and NGC 2168 sits near the westerly foot of Castor in Gemini. The small open cluster NGC 2158 is to the lower right of it in this image from the Sloan Digital Sky Survey. The area of sky shown here measures about one finger’s…
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On the early evening of Tuesday, March 15, 2022, the nearly full moon will occult the bright star Algieba in Leo. times vary by location. This scene shows the end of the event at 8:57 pm EDT, after the star has emerged near Mare Crisium. Hello, mid-March Stargazers! Here are your Astronomy Skylights for the…
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The southeastern sky, shown here at 6 am local time at the latitude of Toronto, hosts the bright planets Venus and Mars, with Saturn to the east (lower left). Before the sky brightens too much, observers can try to spot fainter main belt asteroid Vesta near Venus and Mars. Hello, March Stargazers! Here are your…
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This image of Comet C/2021 A1 (Leonard) was taken recently by Dan Bartlett from a dark sky site above the Eastern Sierras Mountains in California. The coma’s greenish glow should be apparent in a telescope. The dust tail may be a challenge. The image was featured as NASA’s APOD for November 21, 2021 Hello, Stargazers!…
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This image of the Iris Nebula in Cepheus was captured through a RASA 11-inch f/2.2 Astrograph telescope and a ZWO ASI294MC Pro CCD camera by Gary Colwell at the North Frontenac Dark Sky Preserve northeast of Toronto, Canada. It shows both the reflection nebulosity and the surrounding dark dusty regions. The image spans 1.5 degrees…
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When Callisto’s round, black shadow crosses Jupiter on Friday night, September 17 between 6:15 pm and 11 pm EDT, it will be on, or near, the Great Red Spot – as shown in this simulated view for 8 pm EDT. The shadow will gradually slide to the left of the spot as Jupiter’s rotation outpaces…
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This photograph of the moon by Michael Watson of Toronto was taken 9 hours after its full phase. It will closely match the appearance of the moon after it rises on Sunday night, August 22 in the Americas. A thin strip along the moon’s right-hand limb will already be darkening, and the craters there will…
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Michael Watson of Toronto captured this trio of images of the April 15, 2014 lunar eclipse. He carefully positioned the moon to show its east to west motion and the circular shape of Earth’s shadow. For the total lunar eclipse of Wednesday, May 26, 2021 the moon will instead cross through the upper half of…
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