All graphics for all the events below are included in the enlarged Sky Diary PDF file downloaded from here.

For a small printable Sky Diary, click here.

More latest news and events, more details, keep (BIG) Bang up to date on my Blog:
Eagleseye Astronomy Blog.

If predictions are right 2013 could bring us two extremely bright comets.
One in March to April 2013 and one from November 2013 into early 2014.
More news here.

Comet 168P/Hergenrother is now starting to fade to about 12th magnitude in Andromeda this month.
Some observers appear to have detected a piece of the comet breaking off.
The comet passes close to The Andromeda Galaxy for a few days either side of the 20th of December.

Any questions, comments or have I made a mistake?

E Mail me: (Dave@eagleseye.co.uk)

Sky condition prediction for Higham Ferrers.

ALL TIMES Universal Time (UT) Unless stated.

The Stars (22:00h on the 1st, 21:00h on the 15th and 20:00h on the 31st of the month).

High overhead at this time of night Perseus and Capella in Auriga dominates. Visible in binoculars close to the open star cluster M38 is the “Smiley Face” asterism. Can you spot it? South of Auriga are Taurus and Orion. Wonderful winter constellations containing many bright stars and deep-sky objects lying right on the plane of the Milky Way. Lepus, the hare crouches beneath Orion’s feet. Towards the north the head of Draco is reaching its lowest point and the little bear, Ursa Major is hanging from the Pole Star by its tail. In the western sky Cygnus and Lyra are disappearing rapidly. Over in the eastern sky Cancer is now fairly high up with the lovely open cluster M44, the Beehive Cluster, a great view in binoculars. Leo is now rising bringing with it all the galaxies of Spring.

Algol
This bright naked eye variable star is visible from the UK dimming from its usual 2.1 magnitude to 3.4 at the following times:
9th 05.29h, 12th 02.18h, 14th 23.07h, 17th 19.56h.

Last Qtr. – 6th.
New – 13th.
First Qtr. – 20th.
Full – 28th.

As an aid to identifying the planets and stars, the Moon will be close to:
Saturn on the 10th.
Venus on the 11th.
Mercury on the 12th.
Mars on the 15th.
Jupiter on the 25th.

The Planets.
Mercury

Reaches greatest western elongation on the 4th.
It will be visible low in the south eastern sky just before dawn.
On the 11th and 12th Mercury and Venus make a nice trio with a thin crescent Moon.

Venus

Very bright in the south eastern sky before dawn.
Moves rapidly towards the Suns glare throughout the month getting lower in the sky.

Mars

Still trying to battle the Suns glare in the evening sky, so may just be spotted just after sunset low in the south western sky

Jupiter

Big and bright at magnitude -2, located just above the Hyades star cluster in Taurus.
Reaches opposition on the 3rd when it will be at its biggest and brightest..
Keep an eye on the cloud belts for disturbances that have recently been reported.

Saturn

At magnitude 1.35 and now becoming easier to observe in the early morning sky, rising by 4am mid-month.
The rings are now well open and a wonderful sight through even a small scope.

Uranus & Neptune
Still visible in the evening sky but becoming less favourable as they get lower in altitude after sunset.

Geminid Meteor Shower
These meteors are at maximum on the early morning of the 14th. Rates estimated at about 100 per hour. With the Moon out of the way it could be a really good show.

Ursid Meteor Shower
These meteors reach maximum activity between the 22 and 23rd of the month. Rates estimated at about 10 per hour.

The Sun
A new solar cycle is now well under way, and the Sun has had a recent flurry of sunspot activity with some nice large spots groups now appearing regularly. There have also been some auroral activity seen as far south as Kent, so keep a look out.

There have also been some large prominences visible from time to time and some quite active flare regions.
So if you have access to a Ha solar scope, take a look.

Click here for latest news from Space Weather.

All graphics for all the events below are in the enlarged PDF file here.

All times UT (BST) Unless otherwise stated.

Thank you for visiting my site, I hope you have found it of interest.

If you have, or even if you have not liked me, please let me know so I can keep making improvements:
dave@eagleseye.co.uk

Dave Eagle

Eagles Eye On The Sky.

Keep Looking Up!

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A clear night beckoned, so I missed the meeting of Bedford AS (Sorry Folks!) so I could get out and image Jupiter as it approached opposition.

Jupiter looked absolutely wonderful, with Ganymede and its shadow in transit at the start of the observing session.
The Red Spot was just coming onto the disk as well adding to the drama.

I used my £8 webcam to take some images of the planet.
Although the images didn’t come out as good as I had hoped this time, there was an unexpected bonus at the end of the evening. I kept imaging until the Red Spot reached the other side of the disk before calling it a day. (I hope to put the resulting images into an animation once I have finished processing them all). If I hadn’t had to get up for work I would have probably made a night of it.

Right at the end of the session I also took an exposure that was more favourably exposed for Ganymede after it had left the disk of Jupiter.
So I put the two images together to make this composite.

When I looked closely at the image of Ganymede I thought it looked like there was a bright spot and a possible light band running across it. Trust the cheap camera and wobbly seeing conditions to give such awful artefacts!

Anyway, after a lot of thought and deliberation, I did a simulation using Stellarium.
This did show in fact that Ganymede was presenting a bright spot and a number of features, that give the impression of a light band across it, towards us at that time as shown below.

I never thought I’d be able to distinguish any features on another Moon, even vaguely.

So as you can imagine, I’m well chuffed!

Dave

Bedford Astronomical Society held an outreach event at St Lawrence School in Wymington on the 23rd of November.
Linton did four talks in the hall while a collection of members (including me) stood out in the car park with a large collection of telescopes for people to look through.

Very soon a string of parents with their children formed orderly queues at all of the telescopes.
I guess there was close to 200 people attending.

Lots of gasps, “oohs!”, “Ahs!”and “Wows!” and excited faces when they saw the Moon, Pleiades and various other objects made the whole thing so enjoyable and rewarding.

The image of the Moon above St Lawrence’s Church at the top was taken by BAS Member Dawn.
Picture of telescope below taken by Peter Truscott.

Dave

As part of Northampton Natural History Society I did a talk to the scouts at Pitsford last night.

Despite torrential rain and wind, there were about 20 scouts who enjoyed a slide show from me and chatted to the rest of the guys about their telescopes they had bought in.

Unfortunately, the nasty weather meant we couldn’t show them the sky properly.

But it was nice to talk to a very enthusiastic bunch of scouts, who asked lots of questions.
At least 3 said they would take the Astronomy badge.

A great night out.

Just got round to processing the images of an ISS solar transit taken last weekend.

White Light filter with a Skywatcher ED80 and 2x converter using a Nikon D5100 in HD video mode.

The ISS was just above the North coast of France when I took these images, so it looks extremely small.

Event took almost one and half seconds to traverse the disk of the Sun.

Dave

Observers in Cairns have had a great view of a 2 minute solar eclipse.
Some bright prominences were visible during totality.

See Harry Hamill’s (Member of Nene Valley AS) account of his experience on the Nene Valley Blog:
http://neneastro.forumotion.co.uk/f1-nene-valley-astronomical-society

The Telegraph Web site has more details.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/earth/earthvideo/9676429/Total-solar-eclipse-delights-Australians.html#

It was even captured from a hot air balloon.

http://www.hotair.com.au/

Dave

All graphics for all the events below are included in the enlarged Sky Diary PDF file downloaded from here.

For a small printable Sky Diary, click here.

More latest news and events, more details, keep (BIG) Bang up to date on my Blog:
Eagleseye Astronomy Blog.

If predictions are right 2013 could bring us two extremely bright comets.
One in March to April 2013 and one from November 2013 into early 2014.
More news here.

Comet 168P/Hergenrother is shining at around 12th magnitude in Pegasus this month.
It suddenly brightened, when it should never have reached over 14th magnitude.
Some observers appear to have detected a piece of the comet breaking off.
Click here for more details and a path of the comet until the end of November.

Any questions, comments or have I made a mistake?

E Mail me: (Dave@eagleseye.co.uk)

Sky condition prediction for Higham Ferrers.
ALL TIMES Universal Time (UT) Unless stated.

The Stars (22:00h on the 1st, 21:00h on the 15th and 20:00h on the 31st of the month).

High overhead at this time of night Andromeda dominates the sky. Perseus is also well overhead, with its bright variable star Algol (See details below). The Milky Way runs from the horizon in the WNW, right overhead through Cygnus, Cepheus, Cassiopeia, Perseus, Auriga, Gemini, Orion & Monoceros. In the western sky, Cygnus is now swooping down towards the horizon, taking Lyra with it. Altair in Aquila has almost set. Towards the north east The Plough is stating to gain in altitude. Low in the south are Cetus and Pisces Austrinus. Its brightest star Formalhaut looks very lonely having very few bright stars around it. Towards the east Orion is now showing its dominance, fighting Taurus the Bull. Just rising is the constellation of Cancer containing the bright open star cluster M44, the Beehive Cluster.

Algol
This bright naked eye variable star is visible from the UK dimming from its usual 2.1 magnitude to 3.4 at the following times:
1st 22.9h, 22nd 0.6h, 24th 21.4h, 27th 18.3h.

Last Qtr. – 7th.
New – 13th.
First Qtr. – 20th.
Full – 28th.

As an aid to identifying the planets and stars, the Moon will be close to:
Jupiter on the 1st.
Venus on the 11th.
Mars on the 16th.
Neptune on the 20th.
Uranus on the 23rd.
Jupiter on the 25th.
Pleiades on the 27th.

The Planets.
Mercury

Starting to appear low down in the eastern sky before dawn as it moves away from the Sun.

Venus

Shining like a beacon in Leo at magnitude -4 in the early morning sky before dawn. Its phase is increasing throughout the month, sporting a gibbous phase. Now getting much  smaller in apparent size as it recedes from the Earth.

Mars

Slowly losing the battle with the Sun’s glow, very low and looking very lost in the west after sunset. The Moon MAY help to lead you to the planet on the 16th when it will be fairly close by.
Jupiter

Big and bright and located between the horns of Taurus the Bull.
At magnitude -2 it rises late evening and visible most of the night.
Keep an eye on the cloud belts for disturbances that have recently been reported.

Saturn

Now starting to emerge into the eastern morning sky.
By the end of the month it will be much easier to observe.

Uranus
At magnitude 5.7, so is theoretically, at least, visible to the naked eye. Binoculars will help you to identify it below Pisces.  A scope will show a small blue-green disk

Neptune
Located in Aquarius. At magnitude 7.8 it will need binoculars or a small telescope to identify. Now getting lower in the evening sky.

Pluto
Located in northern Sagittarius, not far from the open star cluster M25.
At magnitude 14.14 it will be hard to spot amongst the faint background stars so low down in the sky.

Leonid Meteor Shower
This regular meteor shower is active on the 17th of the month.
Predicted rate about 20 per hour. The Moon is well out of the way so conditions should be good. Meteors will only be seen in the early hours once the constellation rises, so look out early mornings a few days either side of the maximum date.

The Sun
A new solar cycle is now well under way, and the Sun has had a recent flurry of sunspot activity with some nice large spots groups now appearing regularly. There have also been some auroral activity seen as far south as Kent, so keep a look out.

There have also been some large prominences visible from time to time and some quite active flare regions.
So if you have access to a Ha solar scope, take a look.

Click here for latest news from Space Weather.

All graphics for all the events below are in the enlarged PDF file here.

All times UT (BST) Unless otherwise stated.

Thank you for visiting my site, I hope you have found it of interest.

If you have, or even if you have not liked me, please let me know so I can keep making improvements:
dave@eagleseye.co.uk

Dave Eagle

Eagles Eye On The Sky.

Keep Looking Up!

No. of visitors since February 2012

Hit Counter