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Starwatch NewsletterMinnesota Starwatch is a newsletter describing the night sky in the Midwest.
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Minnesota Starwatch for October 2009
This is Minnesota Starwatch for October 2009
On October 9th many professional and amateur telescopes will be pointed at the Moon to observe the impact of a satellite. NASA launched the Lunar Reconnaissance and Remote Sensing Satellite (LCROSS) on June 18 on board the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter. It has been orbiting the Moon acquiring images to select the best site to slam into. And that is what it will do at 4:30 AM PDT on Oct 9th. It will impact the Moon in an attempt to look for water vapor and other gases in the ejecta. The goal is too look for water deposited by impacting comets that may be frozen on the dark floors of craters. Enough water may have accumulated over billions of years that it could be used for drinking by humans at a future Lunar base.
As astronomical mystery that repeats every 27 years will be unfolding over the next year. This is epsilon Aurigae (eps Aur), a naked eye luminous supergiant star which every 27 years experiences an eclipse that last more than a year. The bright star is covered by a very large object, possibly as large as the solar system that causes it to dim by about 2.5 times or one magnitude in apparent brightness. It is suspected that the eclipsing object is a flattened disk of dusk around another star. Given eps Aur's brightness, it will be observed by many amateurs as well as professional astronomers during the next several months at many wavelengths to try to solve this long standing mystery.
This month mighty Jupiter will dominate the night sky. It is visible soon after dark in the south in the constellation of Capricorn. Venus is the bright morning star which is very low in the Eastern sky at dawn. Mars rises around midnight and is high in the southeast by morning twilight. In mid October, (Oct 13 – 15) just before sunrise Saturn will be within a few degrees of Venus. On the 13th it is only half a degree from Venus. The Moon is full Oct 4 (the Harvest Moon) . On Oct 11 and 12 the waning quarter Moon will pass close to Mars and on the 16th the thin crescent Moon will form a triangle with Venus and Saturn at sunrise. And after new Moon when it is in 1st quarter phase on Oct 26 it will pass within 4 degrees of Jupiter.
The Astronomy Department's Public Viewing Nights continue this month on the roof of the Tate Physics Building, part of the Twin Cities East Bank Campus. Every Friday night, astrophysics graduate students open up the dome to observe objects through our historic 10.25" refracting telescope. Along with viewing there are also presentations each week about various astronomical topics. Come with astronomy questions to be answered or just to see the night sky. For more information go to www.astro.umn.edu/outreach/pubnight.
The Como Planetarium in St. Paul's Como Park offers limited star shows. For more information, call (651) 293-5398 or check their website at www.planetarium.spps.org. If you're interested in how you can help build the new Minnesota Planetarium, please call 612-630-6151 or visit www.mplanetarium.org.