Photo of the Week.Sunset with cloud reflection that
makes the Sun appear double, with faint sunrays shining upward.
Astronomy news for the week starting Friday, September 5,
2014.
The Moon begins our week in its late waning
gibbous phase, passing third quarter
the night of Monday, September 15, shortly before Moonrise in
North America. It then fades as a waning crescent heading towards
new Moon the middle of next week, on Wednesday the 24th. The
morning of Friday the 19th the crescent will make a fine sight
near Jupiter,
shining up and to the right of the giant planet as they rise in
the east.
The two pairs of planets that have been gracing the evening and
morning skies are separating. Mars, not quite
keeping up with Earth as they orbit, moves toward its namesake Antares in Scorpius, while Saturn dives
downward toward the early evening horizon, setting around 9:30 PM
Daylight Time, less than an hour after the end of twilight. Mars
follows shortly thereafter. The morning scene is more extreme as
Venus falls out of
sight, rising well after dawn's onset. Jupiter on the other hand
rises brilliantly in full darkness around 3:30 AM in Cancer to the southeast of the Beehive cluster. By the end of
October, it will be rising before local midnight (1 AM Daylight
Time).
