Vern’s Weblog

The following is a list of some things to see in the sky this week, July 8 thru July 15, 2007. Some of the events and times given are specific to the Colorado front range (40° N and the MDT timezone).

Highlights

• Io and GRS cross Jupiter starting July 10 11:04 pm to July 11 01:16 am (both centered at July 11 at 0:08 am)
• Dark sky weekend!

International Space Station
The ISS makes a couple passes this week. The brightest one (-1 magnitude) is early in the morning on Saturday July 14. The ISS appears in the SSW around 05:10:34 am and disappears in the ENE at 05:13:05 am.

Sun
The sun rises 5:41 am to 5:45 am MDT and sets 8:34 pm to 8:32 pm MDT this week.
A new region 10963 has rotated into view on the eastern limb. The region is fairly active and has already produced 3 C-class flares and a couple B-class flares. The region is moderately large at 150 Milli-hemispheres (456 million square kilometers — just slightly smaller than the surface area of the Earth). It will reach mid-disk Friday.

Moon
The moon is new on Saturday July 14 at 06:04 am MDT

Planets

Venus is still brightly shining (magnitude -4.4) in the west after sunset.

Saturn is located just a bit below Venus and moving further right (to the north) of Venus. It is now magnitude 1.1 in brightness.

Jupiter is in constellation Ophiuchus and is and is the brightest object (magnitude -2.4) in the sky when you look directly south at 10:15 pm.

For those with scopes, the great red spot crosses the center at the following times this week:
Sun July 8 10:30 pm MDT
Tue July 10 04:14 am
Wed July 11 0:08 am
Wed July 11 at 08:00 pm
Thur July 12 at 05:46 am
Fri July 13 at 01:43 am
Fri July 13 at 9:37 pm
Sun July 15 at 03:23 am
Sun July 15 at 11:18 pm MDT

Io transit starts July 9 at 04:40 am
Io transit starts July 10 at 11:04 pm MDT
Europa starts transit July 13 at 11:25 pm MDT

Pluto is magnitude +13.9 in constellation Sagittarius

Mars is in constellation Aries and is magnitude +0.7. It rises in the ENE just before 1:30 am. Dust storm is currently raging on Mars. Its still only 6.5 arc-sec across.

Uranus is magnitude +5.8 and is in the constellation Aquarius.

Neptune is magnitude +7.9 and is in the constellation Capricornus.

Mercury appears low in the eastern sky about 40 minutes before sunrise.

Comets
Comet C/2006 VZ13 (Linear) is in constellation Bootes. It has a 6.6 arc-min wide coma. It is reported to be brighter than expected at magnitude 7.8. See http://aerith.net/comet/catalog/2006VZ13/2006VZ13.html for charts etc.

Asteroids
There are 16 asteroids magnitude 11 or brighter this week. Locations are for Saturday July 14 at 10:30 pm.

       Name           Constellation         RA              Decl      Mag  

    21 Lutetia        Scorpius           15:59:33        -20 41'18"   11.0  

    4 Vesta           Scorpius           16:04:33       -16 45'10"     6.4  

    9 Metis           Ophiuchus          17:43:58       -27 21'13"    10.2  

  354 Eleonora        Capricornus        20:23:55       -09 54'47"    10.8  

  980 Anacostia       Capricornus        20:13:35       -13 46'20"    10.9  

 1166 Sakuntala       Sagitarius         18:54:50       -23 17'10"    10.8  

   80 Sappho          Aquila             20:09:15       -02 48'17"    10.2  

   71 Niobe           Microscopium       20:41:40       -29 53'48"    10.7  

   40 Harmonia        Capricornus        21:13:04       -20 07'16"     9.8  

   27 Euterpe         Capricornus        21:48:14       -14 50'48"    11.0  

  194 Prokne          Pegasus            21:54:25       +03 28'55"    10.5  

  230 Athamantis      Pegasus            22:42:52       +07 01'30"    11.0  

    2 Pallas          Pegasus            22:54:18       +10 40'45"     9.7  

   12 Victoria        Pisces             00:39:35       +15 28'03"    10.7  

    8 Flora           Cetus              02:19:35       +07 48'15"    10.4  

   29 Amphitrite      Aries              02:41:01       +18 02'57"    10.8

Dark Sky
Dark sky weekend is here again. Time to get out there and enjoy some summertime dark sky views. Here are some of my lists:

Globular Clusters
M3 in constellation Canes Venatici
M5 in constellation Serpens
M4 in constellation Scorpius
M13 and M92 in constellation Hercules
M12 in constellation Ophiuchus
M10 in constellation Ophiuchus
M62 in constellation Ophiuchus
M22 in Sagittarius

Nebula
NGC 6210 in Hercules is a good target for small scopes. Use lots of magnification and a UHC or OIII filter. Look for a round bluish green disk located between two stars.
M8 the Lagoon nebula in Sagittarius is a must see especially in dark skies.
M20 the Trifid nebula in Sagittarius
M57 the Ring Nebula in Hercules
M27 the Dumbbell nebula in Vulpecula
NGC7009 the Saturn Nebula in Aquarius
M17 the Swan emission nebula in Sagitarrius

Be sure to take a trip up to the Veil nebula in Cygnus and stop at both the east and west exits…

This entry was posted on Monday, July 9th, 2007 at 1:18 pm and is filed under Astronomy, Sky this Week. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.