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Night Sky Map and Planets Visible Tonight

84 points by News-Dog 5y ago

Rebelgecko 5y ago
Coincidental timing (or maybe not?). On my walk tonight, I noticed that Saturn and Jupiter were super bright
- samwillis 5y ago
  If you imagine a line from Jupiter to Saturn and continue it again about the same amount (roughly down to the right in the northern hemisphere) you should see Venus, should be brighter than Jupiter.
- PaulDavisThe1st 5y ago
  They've been that way for more than a month. Jupiter is waning in intensity ... a month ago, they were of comparable brightness.
- destitude 5y ago
  You are probably referring to Jupiter and Venus which are super bright. Venus being the brighter one. Saturn is considerably less bright but still visible and lines up between Venus and Jupiter.
gregfjohnson 5y ago
This is fantastic! Marvelous piece of work, thanks.
raffraffraff 5y ago
Hmm. Just saw this and it seems it's all over. Pity it wasn't posted yesterday morning!
Tempest1981 5y ago
Is this what we missed? > LOOK UP! Rare space event tonight as Venus, Saturn, Jupiter and Moon line up - how to see > https://www.express.co.uk/news/science/1533360/space-news-astronomy-tonight-venus-saturn-jupiter-moon-line-up-how-to-see https://www.express.co.uk/news/science/1533360/space-news-as...
- gorgoiler 5y ago
  Have a look tomorrow and tell me they aren’t kind of lined up again. It’s very exciting to see this at sunset. Tilt your head so that the solar system is flat and you can truly feel that you are on the side of a sphere with the sun in the middle and the planets in the plane. Venus is coming towards you (looking down on the system, the planets rotate counter clockwise.) Try to imagine what that will look like in the sky.
  - em-bee 5y ago
    i have been observing the planets line up for a few weeks now. i never noticed before. yesterday i tried your suggestion, and yes, i could really sense where i was on earth in relation to the other planets and stars. suddenly it became obvious how the latitude is calculated based on the position of stars obviously as the outer planets are slower to move around the sun, so they are going to stay in that position for some time to come. pluto is there too, if you have the telescope to see it. venus joined the group a few weeks ago, mercury caught up this week and mars will follow in january and somehow they all seem to be staying in the neighborhood until next summer. so if i interpret this right, there should soon be an opportunity to see all our planets at once.
  - mattcwilson 5y ago
    Isn’t “down” in space “towards the nearest/strongest gravity well?” I’m surmising that what you mean is, if you headed towards Polaris far enough to get perspective on the entire solar system, then from that vantage point the orbits are counterclockwise?
    - jointpdf 5y ago
      All of the planets orbit the sun on approximately the same plane (since we started as a swirling pancake of gas and dust that eventually snowballed into planets, and then you and me). It looks like this: https://media.nationalgeographic.org/assets/photos/000/285/28546.jpg https://media.nationalgeographic.org/assets/photos/000/285/2... If the orbital plane was a surface of water and the northern hemisphere is bobbing above the water, then up is perpendicular to the plane (away from the water, looking down on the top of Earth).
Alakbar 5y ago
There's an Android app which does a very similar thing called Nightshift [0]. [0] https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.waddensky.nightshift https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.waddensky....
cocoa19 5y ago
Try Sky Map app. It's fun to go on a walk when the sky is clear and identify constellations and planets. It was originally made by Google, then open sourced in 2012. https://github.com/sky-map-team/stardroid https://github.com/sky-map-team/stardroid

84 points by News-Dog 5y ago

Rebelgecko 5y ago

Coincidental timing (or maybe not?). On my walk tonight, I noticed that Saturn and Jupiter were super bright

samwillis 5y ago
If you imagine a line from Jupiter to Saturn and continue it again about the same amount (roughly down to the right in the northern hemisphere) you should see Venus, should be brighter than Jupiter.
PaulDavisThe1st 5y ago
They've been that way for more than a month. Jupiter is waning in intensity ... a month ago, they were of comparable brightness.
destitude 5y ago
You are probably referring to Jupiter and Venus which are super bright. Venus being the brighter one. Saturn is considerably less bright but still visible and lines up between Venus and Jupiter.

gregfjohnson 5y ago

This is fantastic! Marvelous piece of work, thanks.

raffraffraff 5y ago

Hmm. Just saw this and it seems it's all over. Pity it wasn't posted yesterday morning!

Tempest1981 5y ago

Is this what we missed? > LOOK UP! Rare space event tonight as Venus, Saturn, Jupiter and Moon line up - how to see > https://www.express.co.uk/news/science/1533360/space-news-astronomy-tonight-venus-saturn-jupiter-moon-line-up-how-to-see https://www.express.co.uk/news/science/1533360/space-news-as...

gorgoiler 5y ago
Have a look tomorrow and tell me they aren’t kind of lined up again. It’s very exciting to see this at sunset. Tilt your head so that the solar system is flat and you can truly feel that you are on the side of a sphere with the sun in the middle and the planets in the plane. Venus is coming towards you (looking down on the system, the planets rotate counter clockwise.) Try to imagine what that will look like in the sky.
- em-bee 5y ago
  i have been observing the planets line up for a few weeks now. i never noticed before. yesterday i tried your suggestion, and yes, i could really sense where i was on earth in relation to the other planets and stars. suddenly it became obvious how the latitude is calculated based on the position of stars obviously as the outer planets are slower to move around the sun, so they are going to stay in that position for some time to come. pluto is there too, if you have the telescope to see it. venus joined the group a few weeks ago, mercury caught up this week and mars will follow in january and somehow they all seem to be staying in the neighborhood until next summer. so if i interpret this right, there should soon be an opportunity to see all our planets at once.
- mattcwilson 5y ago
  Isn’t “down” in space “towards the nearest/strongest gravity well?” I’m surmising that what you mean is, if you headed towards Polaris far enough to get perspective on the entire solar system, then from that vantage point the orbits are counterclockwise?
  - jointpdf 5y ago
    All of the planets orbit the sun on approximately the same plane (since we started as a swirling pancake of gas and dust that eventually snowballed into planets, and then you and me). It looks like this: https://media.nationalgeographic.org/assets/photos/000/285/28546.jpg https://media.nationalgeographic.org/assets/photos/000/285/2... If the orbital plane was a surface of water and the northern hemisphere is bobbing above the water, then up is perpendicular to the plane (away from the water, looking down on the top of Earth).

Alakbar 5y ago

There's an Android app which does a very similar thing called Nightshift [0]. [0] https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.waddensky.nightshift https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.waddensky....

cocoa19 5y ago

Try Sky Map app. It's fun to go on a walk when the sky is clear and identify constellations and planets. It was originally made by Google, then open sourced in 2012. https://github.com/sky-map-team/stardroid https://github.com/sky-map-team/stardroid