Happy New Year dear Ramblers!! Us here at Ramblings of Robert hope that your holiday season was festive and bright. For my Asian Ramblers, you have another New Year forthcoming. The annual Chinese New Year (or Lunar New Year in Japan and other select locales) begins February 8. For us here in Penang, this time of year entails a lot of red lanterns, bunting, food and fireworks that will mark the changing from the previous Year of the Horse to the Year of the Golden Monkey.
The first third of 2016 includes some notable sights of our beautiful skies. Before we get to that, I would like to take note of the very-recent discovery of strong evidence of a large-mass planet out in the Kuiper Belt region of our Solar System. Scientists estimate that this planet is about ten times the size of our Earth.
Although it has not actually been observed or photographed directly, this strong evidence is based on the way certain Kuiper Belt objects behave in their orbits. Of course, very little is known about that far flung region of our solar neighborhood, thus this planet's discovery will excite many people just as New Horizon's flyby of Pluto last year did.
Now, let us get on to looking up once again, shall we.
JANUARY 2016
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The new year starts off with a bang. Although, as of this writing, this has occured, the Quadrantid meteor show dazzles the night skies with up to 40 meteors per hour. This shower is from leftover debris from Comet 2003 EH1 discovered in, of course, 2003. This shower runs from New Year's Day to about January 5.
The meteors appear to radiate from the constellation Böotes, near Polaris, the North Star. However, as with all other meteor showers, they can appear anywhere in the sky. As stated in the previous Looking Up blog, it is best to look about 90 degrees from the radiant to give the best chance of seeing long meteor streaks, as well as observing from a dark location far from city lights.
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The Moon reaches apogee and will achieve a distance of 404,279 km from the Earth. The term "apogee" means the farthest point from the Earth in the Moon's orbit. Also, on this date, Earth achieves perihelion and will be only about 0.98 AU (astronomical units) from the Sun. An astronomical unit, by the way, is the average distance of the Earth from the Sun, or 93 million miles. Oh, "perihelion" means the closest point to the Sun in the Earth's orbit.
20-Feb. 20
Stargazers will be in for a rare cosmic treat. The five planets observable with the naked eye from Earth will appear to be aligned in the southern sky in the predawn hours. This has not occured since 2005. According to Brian Lada, a meteorologist with Accuweather.com, the optimal time to view these five cosmic gems will be about an hour and a half before sunrise. Any earlier, some of the planets will not be visible; any later, the light of the sun will drown them out.
Venus, Mercury and Saturn will be clustered near the southeastern horizon at this time. Jupiter and Mars will be off towards the southwest. You can find Mercury (the dimmest object) as it will be close to Venus (the brightest after the moon). Although Mars is relatively dim, it's distinct reddish glow will help observers find the Red Planet.
Of course, if waking up super early to brave the cold proves too daunting a task, this alignment will occur again in mid-August. As a complement, Uranus and Neptune will also appear in the first half of the night. However, these two require binoculars or a telescope to view.
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The Moon will be on the same side of the Earth as the Sun, thus will be it's new phase and not visible at night. This would be a good night for amateur astronomers and budding stargazers to hone in their observation skills (if weather permits, of course. Can't really stargaze when it is raining outside, huh?!?)
FEBRUARY 2016
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The month of love (and ang pow for my Asian Ramblers), will bring some delightful sky events. This date will give us the innermost planet Mercury at it's greatest western elongation. What this means is that it will appear in the early morning at its highest point above the eastern horizon, which is about 28°. Mercury normally is harder to spot as it is smaller and dimmer than Venus.
However, as Earth's twin will be near Mercury as part of the aforementioned planetary alignment, it should be easier to spot.
Oh, and for those of you wondering, 10° is about the length of a clenched fist on an outstretched arm.
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Another new moon will occur on this date. That means no moonlight to interfere with the observation of faint nebulae, galaxies and such. Also, this would be a good date to view that planetary alignment.
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A full moon occurs on this date (President George Washington's birthday for my American Ramblers..see a little something for everybody). According to SeaSky.Org, this is known as the "Full Snow Moon", as the heaviest snows often occured during this time of year. Also, "Full Hunger Moon" was another piece of nomenclature used by those Native American tribes, as those heavy snows made hunting very difficult.
MARCH 2016
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The month o' the green will bring some very dazzling celestial events depending on where you are on this globe. This first should be visible to everyone. The 5th planet Jupiter will be at opposition on this date. When a planet is at "opposition", this means that it will appear in the sky opposite of the Sun.
Obviously, this means Ol' Jove will appear at night fully illuminated by our local star. Plus it will be at it's closest approach to Earth and will appear somewhat brighter than normal. If you are a budding stargazer or astrophotographer, now would be the best time all year to pin your focus on the king of planets. A good pair of binoculars or a telescope will reveal it's distinctive cloud bands, as well as the famous Great Red Spot; plus it's four largest or Gallilean, moons Europa, Io, Ganymede and Callisto.
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This the type of celestial event, other than a meteor shower, that gets media attention. That's right..a TOTAL SOLAR ECLIPSE! For those of my Ramblers that are located in Sumatra or Kelimantan, Indonesia or on a boat in the Pacific, you will get to see the Sun's disk completely blotted out by the new Moon at about 8:17am Malaysia time.
Here, day becomes night as the Sun's outermost layer, the corona becomes visible. For those of you in the rest of southeast Asia (such as my myself), will get to wake up to a partial solar eclipse. Penang is close enough to the path of totality as to have about 75% of the Sun's face blocked by the Moon. That is sufficient to darken the morning sky noticeably.
20 Vernal Equinox
At 0430 UTC (12:30pm Malaysia time) the Sun will cross the celestial equator. This will mark the beginning of spring for my Northern Hemisphere Ramblers and autumn for my Southern Ramblers. No matter which side of 0° degrees latitude you lie, day and night will be roughly equal. Speaking of the Equator, the Sun will be directly overhead at local noon there on this date (shadows will be the shortest or nonexistent.)
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Exactly two weeks after the spectacular solar eclipse will come a lunar eclipse. However, this will only be what is known as a penumbral eclipse. The Moon's disk will only pass through the lighter outer portion of Earth's shadow, or the penumbra. Most probably would not even notice any darkening.
The eclipse will be visible throughout most of extreme eastern Asia, eastern Australia, the Pacific Ocean, and the west coast of North America including Alaska.
Also on this date is the first full moon of spring. This full moon was known as the "Full Worm Moon", as the ground would be softening and earthworms would begin to appear.
APRIL 2016
The fourth month of 2016, which brings us Easter sometimes..not this year though.. also has a few scintillating sky events to behold. Let us see what the first full month of spring brings to the heavens.
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The first new moon of April is upon us this day. As it will be on the sunward side of our globe, it's silvery light should not interfere with any observing of faint deep-sky objects. This would be a great time to make your way through the Messier catalogue of objects with your trusty telescope.
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Remember back in February when tiny Mercury was at visible in the eastern sky before dawn? Well, if you missed that spectacle because it would have been WAY too early, then you are in luck my skygazing Ramblers. The first planet from the Sun makes another appearance in our firmament..this time at the other extreme in it's orbit. This means that it will be visible in the WESTERN sky just after sunset. Of course, it won't have it's cosmic neighbors to accompany, so it may be somewhat harder to find, as it never goes higher than 28° from the western horizon.
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Ah yes! This is the time one of the most well-known meteor showers will peak..the Lyrids. This meteor shower results from debris from Comet C/1861 G1 Thatcher, which was discovered in 1861. As with most meteor showers, the best time to view the Lyrids would be anytime after midnight to just before dawn. The Lyrids are so named because they appear to radiate from the constellation Lyra the Harp. These meteors can sometimes produce bright dust trails that last for several seconds.
I should note that this shower actually begins on the 16th of April and concludes on the 25. If for whatever reason you miss the peak of the Lyrids, you can catch them on any of those other nights. Also, there will be less of the Moon's light to interfere with your viewing, as on the peak night there will be a full moon.
Well my wonderful Ramblers, thank you for your continued reading patronage of this exciting series. Stay tuned for the next in this series of Looking Up..and make sure you don't hurt your necks in doing so!
Five Planets Align courtesy of (Photo/AccuWeather Astronomy Fan Garry) taken October 11, 2015.
Total Solar eclipse 1999 in France. * Additional noise reduction performed by Diliff. Original image by Luc Viatour. Courtesy of Wikipedia.com
Mercury image courtesy of NASA-APL - NASA via Wikipedia.com
All other photos are property of the author with all rights reserved.
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