OTEvents November 2021

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ISS pass tonight5:5:56 pm (thank you , SoCal fog)

by Jane Houston Jones

To add insult to injury tonight, there is an ISS pass at 5:56 p.m. Pacific (Southern California only). It will appear 10° above SW horizon. Visible for 5 minutes, it disappears 26° above NE horizon. Maximum height is 79°. You can get your own ISS alerts here, by signing up at NASA's Spot The Station website. https://spotthestation.nasa.gov/ Another fun and free tool is Heavens Above, a website/App where you can find flyover data on many additional satellites, and check after the fact to verify something you saw. https://www.heavens-above.com/ A final astronomers resource for both light pollution data and cloud cover is the Clear Sky Chart. Here is the list of the many California charts, so you can see if your particular area will be more cloudy or less cloudy tonight or anytime. https://www.cleardarksky.com/csk/prov/California_charts.html. Click on a category such as "Cloud Cover" to get a great explanation. You might find it useful to check out sky conditions when you'll be traveling, vacationing. You might even find a great dark sky location or astronomy club you didn't know about! There are hundreds of charts for each state in the US, all the Canadian provinces, Mexico and even the Bahamas.:-) https://www.cleardarksky.com/csk/index.html#chart_list Our forecast is still for marine layer tonight, but I'll be out hoping to catch some ISS views early and Eclipse views later. Let me know if you luck out. -- Jane Houston Jones, retired JPLer Twitter: @jhjones @otastro Instagram @janehoustonjones http://www.otastro.org/ Astronomy,travel,music,food,cats

3 years, 1 month

Look up! Partial Lunar Eclipse Nov 18-19 (Thursday night Friday morning)

by Jane Houston Jones

Hi everyone, there's a fantastic partial lunar eclipse that begins at 11:18 p.m. Pacific tomorrow night! It will reach its partial maximum (just barely not total) maximum two hours later at 1:02 am Friday morning and the partial eclipse ends at 3:47 am. An hour before and after this span is the subtle and fainter penumbral eclipse, when Earth's penumbral shadow starts touching the Moon's face. It looks like we will have some cloud cover here in the LA area, but hopefully, not enough to stop you from staying up or setting your alarm to step outside to view, sketch or photograph some part of the eclipse. You can find more info, and can switch locations outside southern CA here. https://www.timeanddate.com/eclipse/in/usa/los-angeles Your sidewalk astronomers will not be out on the corner this late at night, but we'll be hopefully enjoying the eclipse at home just like you! This eclipse will look very much like the (most recent) May 2021 total lunar eclipse - view it here if you want to see how close to full tomorrow's partial eclipse is - it is a great comparison. https://www.timeanddate.com/eclipse/lunar/2021-may-26. Hopefully you'll be able to notice (tomorrow night) the lower edge of the moon remains much brighter than the deep red or ochre hue we can expect across the rest of the moon's face, as shown below. Tips from astronomer David: "You can view the lunar eclipse with your bare eyes or a pair of binoculars from anyplace where the Moon is visible. Unlike a solar eclipse, no precautions are needed, just find the Moon shortly before the eclipse starts, and enjoy the show! It will be most apparent that something is happening between 11:15 PM to 2:45 AM" For those not in our time zone, find your location, maps and tips here: https://www.timeanddate.com/eclipse/lunar/2021-november-19 Time and date - watch the whole animation here https://www.timeanddate.com/eclipse/in/usa/los-angeles?iso=20211119 video on timeanddate.com Eclipse images Total Lunar Eclipse montage courtesy of David Hasenauer Here are a few of my favorite resources: NASA: https://solarsystem.nasa.gov/moons/earths-moon/lunar-phases-and-eclipses/ What's Up: https://solarsystem.nasa.gov/skywatching/home/ Jane and the Old Town Sidewalk Astronmers -- Jane Houston Jones, retired JPLer Twitter: @jhjones @otastro Instagram @janehoustonjones http://www.otastro.org/ Astronomy,travel,music,food,cats

3 years, 1 month

Sidewalk Astronomy tonight Nov 13 5:45 - 8:30 p.m.

by Jane Houston Jones

Hi everyone! We'll have a few of our sidewalk astronomers out tonight at Monrovia's Library Park from 5:45 - 8:30 p.m. On display (as you may have noticed lately), will be the moon, Jupiter and Saturn. Venus may be visible low in the west right after sunset. There's a nice graphic of tonight's sky our astronomer Gary created, and I posted it on twitter here https://twitter.com/otastro We've been getting a lot of requests from schools and community groups for astronomers/events. Let us help you select your date, and give us two months (preferably) lead time , to planso we don't end up with too many events for our small group of astronomers all in the same week. Thanks, Jane and the rest of the Old Town Sidewalk Astronomers. PS This month's NASA What's Up podcast is here :-) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fzeK4TcOSPU -- Jane Houston Jones, retired JPLer Twitter: @jhjones @otastro Instagram @janehoustonjones http://www.otastro.org/ Astronomy,travel,music,food,cats

3 years, 1 month

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OTEvents November 2021