A CLOSE ENCOUNTER WITH JUPITER: Jupiter is about to have its closest encounter with Earth in 59 years. On Monday, Sept. 26th, the giant planet will be just 591 million kilometers away. Yes, that really is close. Look for Jupiter rising in the east at sunset shining four times brighter than Sirius, the brightest star in the sky. Through a backyard telescope it looks like this.
SPACEX JELLYFISH: Up and down the US east coast, people are reporting a comet-like object in the sunset sky. "I saw it from the riverfront in Wilmington, North Carolina," says Conrad Pope, who had to combine four side-by-side exposures to capture the entire phenomenon:
It was a SpaceX Jellyfish, created by the Saturday evening (7:32 pm EDT) launch of a Falcon 9 rocket from Cape Canaveral. Fifty-two new Starlink satellites were onboard. These formations appear almost every time SpaceX launches a new batch of Starlinks at dusk or dawn. Sunlight reaches up from below the horizon to illuminate the exhaust plume, making it extremely visible in the twilight sky.
more images: from Dr. Gilbert Plumer of Rockledge, Florida; from Kevin R Witman of Georgetown, Maryland; from Alessandro Magli of Belmont, Massachusetts; from Brent of Orlando, Florida
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A GIANT PROMINENCE AND THE ISS: For days, solar astronomers have been monitoring a behemoth prominence on the sun's southeastern limb. Eduardo Schaberger Poupeau was watching yesterday when the International Space Station (ISS) flew by:
"The huge prominence rising 100,000 km above the sun's surface was already a great spectacle," says Poupeau. "The addition of the ISS made it a special view indeed."
The ISS is gone now, and so is the prominence. It erupted during the late hours of Sept. 24th. SOHO coronagraphs show a CME emerging from the blast site. The storm cloud will not hit Earth. Solar flare alerts: SMS Text.
more images: from Alan Friedman of Buffalo, NY; from Mike Borman of Evansville, Indiana; from James Roger Samworth of Nailstone, UK; from Chris Schur of Payson, Arizona;
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ROSE QUARTZ HEART PENDANT: Take a heart shaped piece of rose quartz; wrap it in a sterling silver sunflower filigree; then launch it to space. That's how you make an Earth to Sky Rose Quartz Heart Pendant. Here's one flying 107,400 feet above Earth on Aug. 26th:
You can have it for $169.95. The students of Earth to Sky Calculus are selling space pendants to support their cosmic ray ballooning program. Each comes with a greeting card showing the pendant in flight and telling the story of its trip to the edge of space. All sales support STEM science.
Far Out Gifts: Earth to Sky Store
All sales support hands-on STEM education
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