Thursday, May 1, 1980
3
University Daily Kansan
Summer constellations await night in the limelight
3y DON MUNDAY Staff Reporter
May is a month when the summer cottastellies have just about thawed out and are preparing for their annual vernal display.
All five naked-eye planets are also visible during the evening in the latter part of the month. As the summer wanes, however, the atmosphere increases into the morning sky.
*LEET-FOOTED* MERCURY will reappear on the water in August. Although Mercury is often difficult to see, it will be hard to miss June 2 because it will be a half-of-a-neon conjunction.
Before that encounter, Venus will blaze in the western evening sky, reaching its greatest brilliant magnitude, 4.2 on May 9. Through a telescope, Venus' disk shrinks from one-third to a crescent, and the planet is slowly sinking into the solar glass that will be dead in the twilight, but it will reappear next month as a morning star.
Meamwhile, a lot of action will take place at the top of the sky during the early evening. The two bright stars are Mars and Jupiter, with a simple this month with the star Regulus in Leo.
Mars and Jupiter are now moving silently toward each other for the third and final conjunction of the current series. On May 4, they'll be less than one degree apart, but there shall be no problem distinguishing Mars by far the brighter and Mars is by far the reader.
Mars, at magnitude +0.4, and Jupiter, at magnitude -1.9, are wandering about Leo this month, as Saturn, at magnitude +1.
SATURN AND MARS are working their
own projects. In the other major con-
junction this year include a Venus and Saturn encounter in November
and a Venus and Jupiter coupling a few
moons.
As for the moon, it was full yesterday and
is wailing to its last quarter phase on May 7. New moon will be on May 14, with the first quarter on May 21 and full moon again on May 29.
The moon, which has the advantage of making it easy to see on a morning, during May pass by, or occult, several planets. On the nights of May 21(2), the moon will graze or block Jupiter's orbit.
BUT THE PLANETs certainly don't have a monopoly on the heavens, as the summer constellations now coming into view prove. Although winter constellations may be more identifiable, summer constellations don't require the observer with a problem of frostbite.
A trio of stars will be rising this month and will dominate the skies for some time to come. The sun is in the Summer Triangle. To get a preview of it, look in the northeast sky around midnight.
The brightest and highest of the three stars is Vega in the constellation Lyra. To its lower left is Dedem in a cross-shaped triangle, with the third point it Alarra, a bright star in Aqua. The triangle will rise a little earlier each day and will appear by 10 p.m. on June 1 and asamed on July 1.
Vega is hard to miss because it's the brightest nighttime star from the northern hemisphere. The overwinter Star is brighter. In early May, Vega rises above the horizon.
BLUSH-WHITE VEGA, a star of magnitude +0.1 and 218 year-highears, is the only bright star in a constellation that would otherwise be rather drab. Lyra is supposed to represent a lye or harp, but it is also known as the turtle. This seemingly anomaly comes from an old legend that strings drowned out a tortoise shell.
In about 12,000 years, Vega will be the northern star, a distinction now held by the somewhat dim Polaris. Long before the
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Precession results from an oscillation of the earth's polar axis, making it vibble like a spinning top in a 26,000-year cycle. Thus, we can see that Earth is oscillating point to different stars; as recently as 3,000
pyramids were built, Vega was also the pole star, part of a process known as precession
The second component of the Summer Triangle, Deneb, represents the tail of the swan, Cygmus. Cygmus also is known as the Northern Cross from its shape.
Deneb is an arabic word meaning tail, and
Northeast
The Summer Triangle
Positions are for midnight, May 11; 10 p.m., June 1; and sunset, July 1.
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is on the opposite end of the cross from the star representing the head, Alhireo. Through a telescope, Alhireo is an unusual object in its components blue and the other yellow.
FOLLOW A LINE CONNECT Vega with three and the line will arm Vega with the third part of the Summer Triangle. If it weren't for the triangle, Vega would evade and possibly be a foreground element of the sky.
Altair is 16 light-years away and for some reason has been a favorite setting for science fiction novels.
A feature visible all year, and that can be seen from her dress. She measures through Dorebe and Altar, in the Milky Way. It gets its name from its milky appearance as a faint band crossing the sky.
A glance at the Milky Way is really a look into the heart of the galaxy. The galaxy is actually much brighter than that, but interstellar dust blocks out most of the light from the stars. This makes it seem be almost as illuminated by the billions of stars as the daytime sky is to the sun.
THE MILKY WAY galaxy is believed to resemble a whirling Danish patry, with the sun positioned on two-thirds of the way up the disk and should be fortunate the sun is out on the suburbs of the galaxy—the inner part is believed to be a star that gives new stars are constantly formed.
In early May at 11 p.m., the Milky Way
begins in the northwest, curves northward through Cygmus and Alaira and sinks in the north. By Jub 1, Cygmus will be at the top of the hill. By Jub 2, Way will stretch from the north to the south.
Features of the summer sky beside the Summer Triangle include numerous bright stars.
A reddish stag high in the western sky—don't confuse it with Marvs -is Arcturus, in the constellation Bootes, the herdsman or hunter. Arcturus is a first-magnitude red giant star, about 25 times larger than the sun. Arcturus is mentioned in the book of Joseph, which most modern translations simply refer to it as the hunter rather than Arcturus.
Lackily, Antares is more than 500 lightyears away.
ANOTHER RED STAR burns low in the southeastern sky. It is Antares, in the zodiacal constellation Scorpio, the scorpion. Antares means "similar to Mara" because of their proximity to the Sun, a very low density but with a diameter of nearly 300 million miles—meaning if Antares were positioned where the sun is, its surface would stretch out past the orbit of
a different color—or a star of a different hue, anyway—is *Spic*, halfway up the southwestern sky. Blush Spic, 220 and 221 marks the constellation of the zodiac Vulpix.
The observatory on top of Lindley Hall is open for public viewing of the heavens on clear Friday nights.
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9-10 - The Janet Jameson Band
14 - Marx Bros. in A Night at the Opera & A Day at the Races
15 - An encore performance The Rocky Horror Picture Show
16 - Limosine
21 - Fantastic Planet
17 - Gran Max & The Method
22 - David Allen Coe
29 - Red Steagall & The Coleman County Cowbys
30-31 - Son Seals Blues Band
5 - MeAeSHeH 2 shows
23 - Used Parts
28 - Kentucky Fried Movie
24 - Alchemy
7. Echo Cliff
9 - Harold & Maude
17th & Mass. Where the stars are call for concert info 842-6930