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COSMIC COINCIDENCE:
What are the odds? On Tuesday morning, Feb. 24th, Saturn and Comet
Lulin will converge
in the constellation Leo only 2o apart. At the same time,
Comet Lulin will be making its closest
approach to Earth (38 million miles), while four of Saturn's
moons transit
the disk of the ringed planet. Oh, and the Moon will be New,
providing dark skies for anyone who wishes to see the show. All
you need now ... is a
telescope.
ONE O'CLOCK IN THE
MORNING: Set your alarm for 1 am. That's
the best time to see Comet Lulin riding high in the southern sky
pleasingly close to golden Saturn: sky
map. To the unaided eye, Lulin looks like a faint patch of gas.
Point your telescope at that patch and you will see a lovely green
comet.
Astrophotographer Phil Jones sends this photo, a long exposure
through a 4-inch Takahashi refractor, from the grounds of the Central
Texas Astronomical Society Observatory in Clifton, Texas:
Got clouds? No problem. The Coca-Cola
Space Science Center in Columbus, Georgia, plans to webcast
the encounter. "We're going to transmit the view through our
observatory's 16-inch Schmidt-Cassegrain telescope," says astronomy
professor Rosa Williams of Columbus State University. "The
webcast begins at 11:30 EST on Monday, Feb. 23rd and will continue
until 5 a.m. EST on Tuesday the 24th." Tune
in!
SPEEDING COMET: "On
Feb. 21st, Comet Lulin was visible to the naked eye with identical
brightness as star b Vigo HP58510 with a magnitude of 5.35,"
reports Eddie Irizarry of the Sociedad de AstronomÃa del Caribe
in Puerto Rico. "But what caught our attention most was Lulin's
noticeable speed. Using a telescope, take a good look at the stars
that surround Comet Lulin; then look again just 10 minutes later
and you will see how Lulin's position has changed. It is amazing
how fast this comet is moving!"
UPDATED: Comet
Lulin Photo Gallery
[Comet
Hunter Telescope] [Sky maps: Feb.
22, 23,
24, 25]
WEEKEND AURORAS:
A solar wind stream hit Earth on Saturday, Feb 21st, and stirred
up geomagnetic activity around the Arctic Circle. "It was very
quiet until midnight and then the sky lit up with beautiful Northern
Lights," reports Sylvain Serre from the Inuit village of Salluit
in northern Canada. He snapped this picture using his Canon
EOS 30D:
Photo details: Canon
EOS 30D, 16mm fisheye, f2.8, 800 ISO, 3 sec
The solar wind stream that triggered the display came from a coronal
hole--a magnetic "weak spot" in the sun's atmosphere that
allows solar wind to escape into the solar system. The next coronal
hole won't turn to face Earth for at least a week, which means Arctic
auroras will probably subside until the early days of March. Until
then, browse the gallery:
UPDATED: February
2009 Aurora Gallery
[Previous Februaries: 2008,
2007,
2006,
2004,
2003,
2002]
Explore
the Sunspot Cycle
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