What's In The Sky - July 2020

Get ready for summer stargazing! With the weather warming up, July is a great time of year to enjoy relaxing evenings under starry skies with your telescope or astronomy binoculars. Here are a few of Orion Telescopes and Binoculars picks for July stargazing...

Gas Giants at Opposition

Jupiter and Saturn both reach opposition one week apart this year, making July the perfect opportunity for planetary viewing! Opposition is when the Earth passes directly between a planet and the Sun. This coincides with the planets closest approach to Earth, providing an excellent opportunity for great views in a telescope. Both planets are easy to find in the Southern sky, about 7 degrees apart from each other. Jupiter reaches opposition on July 14th and Saturn about a week later on the 20th. During opposition, Saturn’s rings will be inclined at 21 degrees towards Earth, close to their maximum angle of 27 degrees. Combined with the planet's close approach to Earth, this makes July an excellent time to observe Saturn and its rings!

Jupiter imaged on 12/07/2012 with an Orion 180mm Maksutov-Cassegrain Telescope Optical Tube. Imaged by Cherdphong V. from Bangkok, Thailand.

Grab a high magnification eyepiece or a Barlow lens, and check out the gas giants during opposition!

New Moon

July 20th is the darkest night of the month and therefore the best time to observe the more faint objects like galaxies and star clusters. Grab your observing gear and enjoy!

Hercules almost directly overhead and Scorpius

With constellation Hercules almost directly overhead and Scorpius to the south, there's plenty to see in July skies as summer continues. Check out globular star clusters M13 and M92 in Hercules, and explore Scorpius to find numerous deep-sky objects including open clusters M6 and M7, and globular clusters M4 and M80.

The Summer Milky Way

From a dark sky location in mid-July, the glorious Summer Milky Way shines as a band of light that stretches from the southern horizon to nearly overhead. As the night progresses, the Milky Way will arch across the entire sky. From a dark observing site, scan the Milky Way with 50mm or larger binoculars or a wide-angle telescope to explore some of the hundreds of open star clusters, emission nebulae and planetary nebulae that lurk among the star clouds.

Orion SkyQuest XT8 Classic Dobsonian Telescope Kit.

July Challenge Object — Hercules Galaxy Cluster

About half a billion light-years from Earth in the constellation Hercules, not far from the star Beta Hercules in the southwest corner of the "keystone" asterism, lies the "Hercules Galaxy Cluster." This association is a group of 200-300 distant galaxies, the brightest of which is NGC 6050 at about 10th magnitude and can be seen with an 8" reflector like the Orion SkyQuest XT8 Classic Dobsonian under very dark skies with good seeing conditions. A larger aperture, 14"-16" telescope like the Orion SkyQuest XX14g GoTo Truss Dobsonian will begin to show about a half-dozen or more galaxies in one field-of-view. How many can you see in your telescope?

Orion SkyQuest XX14g GoTo Truss Tube Dobsonian Telescope.

All objects described above can easily be seen with the suggested equipment from a dark sky site, a viewing location some distance away from city lights where light pollution and when bright moonlight does not overpower the stars.

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Northern Hemisphere Forecast for April and May: Showers - With A Chance Of Bolides!

This time of year, presents us with a unique, "all-sky", observing situation: double-header meteor showers - and, the possibility of 'fireballs', and/or, 'bolide' meteors, thrown in!

First comes the Lyrid meteor shower, peaking on 22APR and followed by the Eta Aquarids, peaking on 5MAY.

Ah-Ha! But - the bases are loaded...

There is also, a good chance, for spotting a 'fireball' meteor or two, and, even a "near-once-in-a-lifetime" bolide. This annual recurring situation is where the term, "April Fireballs" comes from (see my article, "The Great Fireball of 1966").

A meteor from the Lyrids meteor shower crossing the milky way - single exposure. Image credit: iStock by Getty Images.

Lyrid meteors originate with the short, long-period comet, C/1861 G1. This comet has one of the shortest periods of all, long-period comets, at just over 400 years. Therefore, its 'wake' is broad and rather dense. Zenithal Hourly Rates (ZHR), are only around 10, for most years - but, with meteor showers, one can never tell. The Lyrids have provided, in, roughly, 60-year outbursts, up to 90 meteors, per hour! The Lyrid radiant in Lyra is close to that constellation's brightest star, Vega, which rises around 8:30 p.m., in the east.

The Eta Aquarids, peaking on 5MAY, is the debris train, left, by the 76-year period comet, 1P/Halley (yes, that one - "Halley's Comet", for you newcomers (oh, you'll learn!))

The Eta Aquarids radiant rises at around 2:45 a.m. and the hour or two just before dawn will be the best viewing (That's what you get for becoming an Astronomer!) The Eta Aquarids occur, this year, near the full moon - but a full moon was never a deterrent to me, for a meteor shower. And, there is assistance at hand...

Meteor showers are the type of event that, you don't want to use a telescope at; at least, not for watching meteors. Typically, meteor showers are viewed with the unaided eye. Some observers will use, low powered, standard-style binoculars - I've tried that myself and, probably, missed, half of the meteors during a shower, by constricting my field of view in using them!

Orion 2 x 54 Ultra Wide-Angle Binoculars

Orion Telescopes and Binoculars have come up with a unique-sounding aid directed at the meteor shower, and, Milky Way density viewer: Orion 2 x 54 Ultra Wide-Angle Binoculars! Somebody finally did it!

Although I haven't tried these, for myself, I get it -- I've imagined similar optics in my, "deep-astronomical" past (around 50 yrs., total!)

Rather than missing out on some meteors by using the confined field of a standard pair of binoculars - these 2x54 ultra-wides sound, more like, an enhanced, 'unaided-eye' field of view, with their offering of a 36° FOV, and 70°, apparent field of view. I can only imagine what the denser portions of the Milky Way look like through these!

IF YOU DO HAPPEN ACROSS A BOLIDE – LET ME KNOW ABOUT IT!

Dale Alan Bryant
Senior Contributing Science Writer

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What's In The Sky - February 2020

Clear February nights present some great stargazing opportunities. Be sure to bundle up and keep warm while you get outside for some stargazing fun!

Here are a few of Orion Telescopes and Binoculars' top picks for February stargazing:

New Moon

February 23rd should be one of the best nights for deep-sky viewing as the New Moon phase will provide the darkest night of the short month. Use Orion Broadband Filters to enhance your view.

On the evening of Monday, February 9th, Mercury (orbit is shown as a red curve) will reach its widest separation, 18 degrees east of the sun. With Mercury sitting above a nearly vertical evening ecliptic, this will be the best appearance of the planet in 2020 for Northern Hemisphere observers. The optimal viewing times fall between 6 and 7 p.m. local time. Viewed in a telescope (inset), the planet will exhibit a waning half-illuminated phase. Image credit: Starry Night.

Mercury High In The Sky

On February 9th, Mercury will be at its greatest eastern elongation, meaning it is at its greatest separation from the Sun. Mercury will be at an altitude of approximately 16 degrees when the Sunsets at 17:34 PST, making it an ideal time to observe this tricky target.

Planetary Lineup Get up early on President's Day, February 17th, to see a lineup of three planets and the Moon. At dawn, the crescent Moon and Mars, Jupiter, and Saturn will form a line spanning about 39 degrees in the southeastern sky.

Before sunrise on the next day, February 18th, viewers in North America can watch the Moon occult Mars! Better yet, try snapping a sequence of high-magnification pics of the event.

Betelgeuse In The News

Betelgeuse has been in the news lately since dimming down to a magnitude of around 1.5, the lowest brightness in more than a century. The red supergiant is normally variable, but the unusual dimming has brought up the question of whether a supernova is imminent. Betelgeuse is close enough that if it went supernova it would be brighter than the full moon, a spectacular astronomical event. However, the consensus is that this probably won't be happening soon. The best estimate is sometime in the next 100,000 years, so it is more likely that this variability is normal, and we've still got a few millennia before the light show.

It may not be as flashy, but if you want to see a supernova now astronomer Koichi Itagaki discovered a supernova on January 12th. Located in the galaxy NGC 4636 in the constellation Virgo, it should be visible with a 6" or larger telescope. Referred to as SN2020ue, it is currently at magnitude 12.1 and should be visible under dark skies at around 60-100x magnification as a dim star just outside of the galaxy's core.

Galaxies M81 and M82 in Ursa Major - 5 x 300 Second LRGB Image by Insight Observatory.

Bright Galaxies

In late February, bright galaxies M81 and M82 will be about as high in the sky as they will get for North American stargazers. From a dark sky site, these galaxies are visible with a 50mm or larger binocular, but we suggest you use a large telescope to chase these galaxies down just off the leading edge of the Big Dipper asterism. Many observers consider M81 & M82 the best pairing of visual galaxies in the sky!

If you would like to receive image data of galaxies such as M81 and M82 and other deep-sky objects taken on the Astronomical Telescopes for Educational Outreach (ATEO), please visit Insight Observatory's Custom Image Data Request form.

All objects described above can easily be seen with the suggested equipment from a dark sky site, a viewing location some distance away from city lights where light pollution and when bright moonlight does not overpower the stars.

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