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Tuesday, January 12, 2016

 

The Sky This Week - Thursday January 14 to Thursday January 21

The First Quarter Moon is Sunday January 17. Jupiter is visible in the late evening sky. Jupiter, Mars, Venus and Saturn form a long line in the morning sky. Venus and Saturn  form a triangle with the red star Aldebaran. 

The First Quarter Moon is Sunday January 17. The Moon is at perigee, when it is closest to the Earth, on the 15th.

Evening sky on Saturday January 16 looking east as seen from Adelaide at 23:55 ACDST. Jupiter is just above the horizon shortly before midnight. Similar views will be seen elsewhere in Australia at the equivalent local time. (click to embiggen).

Mercury is lost in the twilight.

Jupiter enters the evening sky just before midnight daylight saving time, it is low on the horizon for most of the week.

The evening is also graced by the summer constellations of Taurus (with the V shaped cluster the Hyades forming the head of Taurus the Bull and the beautiful Pleiades cluster nearby) Orion the Hunter and Canis Major with bright Sirius, the dog star, climbing above the north-eastern horizon.

Early morning sky on Sunday January 17 looking east as seen from Adelaide at 5:00 ACDST showing Mars, Venus and Saturn with the red star Antares close by.  Similar views will be seen elsewhere in Australia at the equivalent local time. (click to embiggen).

Jupiter is high in the northern morning skies and is rising before midnight. 

Mars is higher in the morning skies and is readily visible in the pre twilight dark.

Venus is easy to see in the morning twilight. It is a  distinct "gibbous Moon" shape and is nice in a small telescope.

Saturn climbs higher in the morning sky.

Venus, Saturn and the red star Antares form a triangle low in the early twilight. During the week Venus moves away Saturn from Saturn making the triangle broader. There are lots of interesting things in the sky to view with a telescope. If you don't have a telescope, now is a good time to visit one of your local astronomical societies open nights or the local planetariums.

Printable PDF maps of the Eastern sky at 10 pm AEST, Western sky at 10 pm AEST. For further details and more information on what's up in the sky, see Southern Skywatch.
 
Cloud cover predictions can be found at SkippySky.
Here is the near-real time satellite view of the clouds (day and night) http://satview.bom.gov.au/

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