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Astronomical Observing at Fishcreek - Friday 6/20/2008

Tonight's event will, again, be somewhat limited by a nearly full Moon the entire night.  We will be able to see the beautiful planet Saturn, colorful double stars, open clusters made up of hundreds of stars, globular clusters comprised of hundreds of thousands of stars.  Unfortunately, the planetary nebula formed by dying stars, diffuse nebula and emission nebula where stars are being born, and galaxies will be rendered invisible to us by the brightness of the full Moon.  Saturn is beautiful beyond words!  If you've never seen Saturn through a telescope, you owe it to yourself to do so.  It's said that one picture is worth a thousand words, but no picture can match the majesty of the real thing!  Jupiter is visible, if you stay after midnight when it will be high enough to clear the trees to our east.

for a list of DeepSky Objects that will be available to us this session.

We hope to see you here for a night under the stars - now in our fourteenth year!

For observing conditions at our site, please click on the link below: 
ClearSkyClock for Fishcreek Site  (the darker blue the squares are, the better)

Quick links:
    Inner Solar System     Outer Solar System    General Information about our events

Moon data   Rises: 10: 46pm Transits: 3: 32am June 21 - Time of highest position in the sky, due South Sets: 8: 24am June 21 Constellation:   Sagittarius Phase:   94.62% illuminated (waning gibbous) Distance:   0.00267725 AU = 400,511 km = 248,866 miles = 1.34 light-seconds Magnitude:   -11.9 Apparent size:   29.83 arcminutes in angular diameter Elongation from Sun:   153.11 degrees (morning sky) Age:   17.29 days since last New Moon Next Phase:   Last Quarter on Thursday June 26, 2008 at 8:10am Next Lunar eclipse:   Total eclipse (100%) on Sunday Sept 27, 2015 at 10:10pm EDT On 6/20/2008 at 10:18:58pm the Moon will be 5.8º below the east-southeast horizon but will look like this just after midnight when it clears the trees to the east... (back to 'Quick Links')

Jupiter data   Rises: 10: 09pm Transits: 2: 51am June 21 - Time of highest position in the sky, due South Sets: 7: 34am June 21 Constellation:   Sagittarius Phase:   99.89% illuminated Distance:   4.21611328 AU = 630,721,569 km = 391,912,218 miles = 35.12 light-minutes Magnitude:   -2.7 Apparent size:   46.76 arcseconds in angular diameter Elongation from Sun:   160.38 degrees (morning sky) On 6/20/2008 at 10:18:58pm Jupiter will be 0.5º above the east-southeast horizon Next transit of the Great Red Spot:  Friday June 20, 2008 11:05pm GRS longitude: 123.1º Jupiter moons activity:       Io goes into eclipse on Saturday June 21, 2008 at 1:52am       Europa goes into eclipse on Saturday June 21, 2008 at 2:24am       Io comes out of eclipse on Saturday June 21, 2008 at 4:33am       Europa comes out of eclipse on Saturday June 21, 2008 at 6:04am Jupiter and its four visible moons will look like this at midnight... (back to 'Quick Links')

Inner Solar System - the Sun, Mercury, Venus and Earth
(Created using Software Bisque's TheSky software)

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Outer Solar System - the Sun, Mars, Jupiter, Uranus, Neptune and Pluto
(Created using Software Bisque's TheSky software)

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General Information you should know about our events - Q&A of Where, When and What


Very sincerely yours,
Dave Jessie
Time spent observing the heavens is not deducted from your life span

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