• Ad Rates
  • Contact Us
  • Terms of Use
  • Privacy Policy

eBroadsheet

Local News Source for Lower Manhattan

  • Home
  • Featured
  • Today In History
  • Current Issue
  • Doorman’s Guide to Lower Manhattan
  • About Us
    • Contact Us
  • Riverwatch
You are here: Home / EYES TO THE SKY October 15 – 28, 2018

EYES TO THE SKY October 15 – 28, 2018

October 15, 2018 By Judy Isacoff Leave a Comment

 

A waxing crescent moon appears to the upper left of planet Saturn in the south-southwest as darkness gathers tonight, the 15th. On the 16th, a half moon (first quarter) is suspended further left of Saturn, approaching red Mars, the most riveting point of light in the sky. By the 19th, a waxing gibbous (larger than half) moon arrives to the left of Mars. Pause to notice a bright, bluish-white star below the moon. It is Fomalhaut, a not too distant Sun, relatively speaking, that appears in our evening sky around the autumn equinox. Follow it as it travels low to the southern horizon into January. Fomalhaut marks the mouth of the Southern Fish: it stands out as the constellation’s sole prominent star.

While looking for the Orionid’s radiant, know that you can extend Orion’s Belt to locate Sirius, the brightest star in the sky.

About a month after Fomalhaut heralds the beginning of autumn, winter’s nighttime constellations begin to rise above the eastern horizon before midnight. Orion the Hunter, the most recognizable of them all, clears the horizon close to 11:40pm on the 15th and 10:40pm on the 28th.

The Orionid meteor shower, predicted to peak before dawn on Sunday the 21st, is active through November 7. At peak, at a dark location under a moonless sky, a maximum of 15 – 20 shooting stars per hour is predicted. A large gibbous moon sets in the west-southwest at 3:51am on the 21st, leaving close to 2 hours of optimum darkness to meteor watch. The Orionids radiate from a point near Orion’s upraised Club, although meteors may be spotted anywhere in the sky.

Another meteor stream, the South Taurids, is active through November 20. Its radiant is to the right of Taurus the Bull, known by its triangular head to the right of Orion’s upper body. From a dark sky area at the end of October several years ago I witnessed a slow-moving fireball with a long, green-tinted tail; it entered my field of view at about 4am. This is a sighting typical of South Taurids.

The Full Hunter’s Moon rises at 6:31 on the 24th and sets at 8:02 on the 25th.

Resources
https://stardate.org/nightsky/constellations/orionhttp://earthsky.org/astronomy-essentials/south-taurid-meteors-to-peak-in-october

Judy Isacoff
(Visited 46 times, 1 visits today)

Share this:

  • Share
  • Facebook
  • Twitter
  • Print
  • Email

Filed Under: Uncategorized Tagged With: Eyes to the Sky 5:39 pm Tagged With: Eyes to the Sky

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.

Search

  • Current Issue
  • About The Broadsheet
  • Archive
  • Ad Rates
  • Contact Us
February 2021
MTWTFSS
1234567
891011121314
15161718192021
22232425262728
« Jan    

Under Construction

  • Log in
  • Entries feed
  • Comments feed
  • WordPress.org

Archive

Subscribe!

To receive daily news letters.

Thank you for joining our newsletter!

Copyright © 2021 · News Pro Theme On Genesis Framework · WordPress · Log in

loading Cancel
Post was not sent - check your email addresses!
Email check failed, please try again
Sorry, your blog cannot share posts by email.