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Starwatch NewsletterMinnesota Starwatch is a newsletter describing the night sky in the Midwest.
It is updated monthly, and is produced by the |
Minnesota Starwatch for November 2004
The month begins with the third quarter Moon on the 5th. New Moon is on the 12th, first quarter is on the 19th, and full Moon on the 26th.
Though we cannot see the dark side of the Moon from Earth, sometimes we can see some of the edges better. This is because of the Moon's librations, or "wobbling". On November 8th (and also during December and January) we can see Orientale, the youngest large basin on the Moon. Finding Orientale basin should be straightforward: look along the limb just to the south of the well-defined dark patch of the crater Grimaldi. The long strips of dark lavas making up the two lakes will confirm your sighting of Orientale.
There are two meteor showers to watch for this month. The more well known one is the Leonid meteor shower, which can be seen in the morning of Nov. 17th, well after the Moon has set. The shower will not be as spectacular as in the last couple of years; only about 10-20 meteors per hour are expected. Despite the low numbers, Leonids tend to be bright and leave persistent trails. The Leonids travel in the 33-year orbit of periodic comet 55P/Tempel-Tuttle, which passed through its closest approach to the Sun in 1998 and is now on its way back to deep space. Expect the next set of spectacular Leonid meteors around 2031!
The second meter shower event is due to the Taurid meteor shower, which can be seen throughout early and mid-November. The Taurids are unusual in that as many meteors can be seen in the evening as in the morning hours. The downside is that the showers are generally weak, usually producing somewhere between 3 and 10 meteors per hour. These meteors are debris from periodic comet 2P/Encke. They are the slowest of any major showers, encountering Earth at only 28 kilometers per second.
This November features an occultation event: on November 9th the thin waning crescent Moon will occult the second-brightest planet, Jupiter. The event will take place at a comfortable time of mid-morning, however, it might be hard to see, even if the skies remain clear. At approximately 9:50am local time Jupiter will disappear behind the bright limb of the Moon, near the bottom of the crescent. It will take about a minute or so to completely disappear. Jupiter will then spend about an hour behind the Moon, re-emerging around 10:40am.
Venus and Jupiter, two planets always separated by great distances in the Solar System, can be seen very close to each other, from Earth, on November 4th and 5th. Try to spot these two: about 1-3 hours before sunrise they will be about a degree apart, or the width of two full moons, in the southeast sky.
For fun Astronomy Outreach programs check out our Public Outreach link, or if you're interested in how you can help build the new Minnesota Planetarium, please call 612-630-6151 or visit http://www.mplanetarium.org.
Como Planetarium is offering fun family shows about astronomy on a limited basis; please call 651-293-5398 for more info!
This has been a Minnesota Starwatch produced by the University of Minnesota Astronomy Department.