Night Sky Astronomy

On February 15th 2013, an Asteroid will be passing by Earth closer to us than the Moon is to our planet and closer to us than some satellites that we have orbiting us. There was a time when some scientists thought that the Asteroid would hit Earth, but they now believe it will miss us (thank goodness!), and will travel pass us at about 17,200 miles away.  This is still pretty close and may possibly allow us, if it is a clear day and night, to view the Asteroid at some point.  Those of us with access to good binoculars and telescopes should have a good view if the skies are clear.

To put the distance that Asteroid 2012 DA14 will swing by us in context, the Moon is 240,000 miles away and geosynchronous satellites are about 26,000 miles away.  So the Asteroid will travel approx 9,000 miles closer to us than these satellites.  The Asteroid itself is a small one compared to most others and is about 45m across with a mass of about 130,000 metric tons, but would still have caused some damage if it actually hit us!

NASA have released a statement regarding the Asteroid with a few more tidbits of information,

‘On [February 15, 2013], the asteroid will travel rapidly from the southern evening sky into the northern morning sky with its closest Earth approach occurring about 19:26 UTC when it will achieve a magnitude of less than seven, which is somewhat fainter than naked eye visibility. About 4 minutes after its Earth close approach, there is a good chance it will pass into the Earth’s shadow for about 18 minutes or so before reappearing from the eclipse. When traveling rapidly into the northern morning sky, 2012 DA14 will quickly fade in brightness.‘

I had a brilliant new Nikon D3200 DSLR Camera for my birthday with extra zoom lens so I thought that I would try and take a photo of the Moon with it, to see how good the zoom was.  I was quite pleased with the outcome (below) as the detail of the Moon shows up really well!

The Moon

I was out on November 3rd at  a Fireworks show in Trispen in Cornwall and whilst I was waiting for the Fireworks to start I was having a good look at the Sky.  It was clear as a bell and a very cold evening, so the Stars were shining brilliantly. To my amazement, I saw a really bright and big shooting star followed by another, and another, and another and another. I think I saw a total of 6 or 7 in the end and they were all really clear to view, and were flying across the Sky right above us! It was an amazing sight as I wasn’t expecting to see a Meteor show as well!

A few days later I looked up whether there were any Meteor showers taking place around this time and found that the Meteors must have been from the Leonids which is a Meteor shower that happens throughout November every year. The best days to view them this year were on the 17th and 20th of November, so I was very lucky to see as many as I did in only about 45 minutes of viewing, a good couple of weeks before the height of the shower.

The Leonids are said to be a lot better quality than the Perseids in August as they are much brighter and about 10mm in diameter, and this was certainly true from my observations. The Perseids paled in comparison to the Leonids. These Meteors originate from a Comet named Tempel-Tuttle, which was discovered in 1865 by Ernst Tempel, and radiate from the constellation Leo (hence their name).

Remember to keep an eye out for them next year as they are a great sight to behold!

On August 31st, we will see the next Blue Moon.

Unfortunately, it doesn’t mean that the moon will be the colour blue, although that would be cool, but it means that there will be two full moons in a single month. The first full moon of the month occurred on the 1st August so there is enough time left in the month for the next full moon to come around. This can happen every 2-3 years, so isn’t actually out of the ordinary. It is also possible for there to be double Blue Moons in a single year which last happened in 1999 when there were two full moons in January and March but no full moon in February. The next time this will happen will be 2018.

There are actually two definitions of a blue moon. The first is what I have written above which originated in the 1940’s, but the other is when there are 4 full moons in a single season (Winter, Spring, Summer or Autumn). The third full moon out of the four is then called the Blue Moon. This came about centuries ago in folklore through old Farmers’ stories. The next one of these Blue Moons will be on August 21st 2013.

But whichever definition you prefer, either way, it is a special month for our companion, the Moon!

The weather forecast was not good for the actual height of the Perseid meteor shower (it turned out to be shocking) so I went out and had a look the day before, which was last Saturday. It turned out to be a strange half hour or so!

When I first went to look outside there was a massive flash of lightning which made me jump as I wasn’t expecting it, so I assumed that the sky would be completely cloudy, but I was surprised to see that the sky was in fact mostly clear. So I went on out and had a good stare at the sky above.  During the star gaze, lightning was still flashing in the distance somewhere over Dartmoor, which made it interesting. In fact, the lightning turned a bit strange at one point as it seemed to be pulsing in one cloud only! It was like the scene in Independence Day when the alien ships first started to appear out of the skies around the world.  The flashes were quick as well – no more than 10 to 15 seconds apart, so there must have been one heck of a storm over Dartmoor somewhere!

Luckily this weird lightning storm didn’t take anything away from the meteors as I saw some amazing ones shoot across the sky.  On some, the ‘tail’ that they left was very distinct and easy to see well after the meteor itself had vanished! I think in the time I was out there (not much more than half an hour or so), I saw 6 or 7 meteors with probably 3 or 4 of those being really big and bright. Add to this, I saw the ISS again (purely by accident this time) and 6 other satellites, which meant it was a great time sky gazing! In fact, a couple of the meteors were up there with the best I have ever seen, although the one I saw in Weymouth last September was still the best ever as it was very bright and large as it streaked across the constellation of Cassiopeia.

Did anyone else manage to see any Meteors or the strange lighting storm? Send me a comment or tweet me (@strethewey) if you did!