Where's Saturn? Is that a UFO--or the ISS? What's the name of that star? Get the answers from mySKY--a fun new astronomy helper from Meade. PLANETS ALIGN: Venus and Saturn are converging for a close encounter on June 30th when the pair will be only 2/3o apart. You can watch the distance shrink in the nights ahead. Step outside after sundown and look west. Venus is the brightest object in the sky; Saturn is the yellow dot right beside it. Sky maps: June 27, 28, 29, 30, July 1. SOLAR FIREWORKS: Suddenly, sunspot 961 is crackling with solar flares. They are minor B-class explosions, amounting to no more than a few million hydrogen bombs, but still exciting to watch through solar telescopes. Cameron LaCroix and John Stetson send this picture from South Portland, Maine: In California yesterday, Gary Palmer photographed a similar blast. "There were a lot of fireworks going off around the sun's eastern limb--and it's not even the 4th of July," says Palmer, who stitched together several images to create a high-resolution 3.6 MB movie of the action. more images: from Cai-Uso Wohler of Bispingen, Germany; from Pete Lawrence of Selsey, West Sussex, UK; from Denis Fell of Wetaskiwin, Alberta; MARTIAN DUST STORM: Amateur astronomers are monitoring a growing dust storm on Mars. "A huge storm is brewing," says veteran Mars photographer Jim Melka of Chesterfield, Missouri. He took this picture on June 25th using a 12-inch telescope and digital camera: "Images taken on the mornings of June 25 and June 27 show the rapid growth of dust bands and clouds in just two days," he says. The instigator of the storm may be the planet's south polar cap, shown prominently at the top of Melka's image. Temperature differences between the cold polar cap and adjacent, warmer, frost-free surfaces cause cold air to come streaming off the ice, picking up dust as soon as it hits frost-free terrain: more. Amateur astronomers who wish to monitor developments must wake up before dawn and point their telescopes east, where Mars shines like a red star of 1st-magnitude: sky map. The bright polar cap and some dark markings can be seen directly in the eyepiece--no camera required. This could change, however, if the dust spreads and hides the surface. "Observers like me hope this doesn't become a global storm," says Melka. more images: from David M. Moore of Phoenix, Arizona. |