By Melanie McQuigg (Y12)
They say that “Every new beginning is another beginning’s end”. So as we trudge towards the end of March and the school term we must revel in the beauty of spring’s appearance: in the blossoms, the flush of leaves on our trees, and the loveliness of our night skies. Our skies will be putting on quite the display over the coming week from the star snatcher to the king and the crescent, the heavens is putting on the performance of a lifetime. So while you soak up the beauty of this new spring, don’t forget to turn your eyes to our night skies, or you might just regret it.
The King and the Crescent – 27th of March
The standout event of this week is the close approach of the Moon and Jupiter, the king of the planets. The waxing gibbous Moon will be positioned particularly close to the largest planet in our solar system, as they transit, paired, across the southwestern sky. The duo will be situated near the iconic Orion the Hunter constellation. Jupiter will appear as a steady, brilliant white point of light that won’t twinkle, serving as a sharp contrast to the textured, glowing surface of the Moon. If you head out about 45 minutes after sunset and look towards the western horizon, you will see the glowing Venus loosely aligned with this amazing duo. This will create almost a “string of pearls” effect but it will only last an hour before Venus descends below the horizon, leaving this spectacular pair to dominate the sky for the rest of the evening.
The Star Snatcher – 29th of March
On this night, there will be the rare astronomical event known as a lunar occultation. This happens when the Moon passes right in front of a celestial object, momentarily hiding it from our sky. The target this night will be Regulus, the “heart of lion” star and the brightest star in the Leo constellation. This will begin in the middle of the evening as the star slowly approaches the dark, unlit edge of the Moon. Regulus will instantly vanish at 7pm (as the Moon has no atmosphere to dim the star’s light, the vanishing will be sudden). One moment the star is there, the next it is gone. You will not be able to see this with the naked eye, so grab your telescope! The star will reappear after being hidden for about 70 minutes and it will abruptly “pop” back into view from behind the Moon’s illuminated edge.
The Ascent of the Evening Star – 1st of April
As we cross into April, Venus is officially entering its most glorious phase of the year. Often referred to as the “Evening Star”, Venus is currently at a high point in orbit relative to Earth which means that it will stay visible to the West long after the sun has vanished. Venus will sit much higher in the sky in spring than it does in autumn and is currently so bright that it can often be seen in the late afternoon if you know precisely where to look. If you look through a telescope or high powered binoculars, you might notice that Venus isn’t a perfect circle, it currently shows a distant gibbous phase, similar to a nearly full moon. As twilight deepens, its light becomes so intense that it almost appears to cast a faint shadow in truly dark areas.