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January Highlights
New Year seems to come quicker every year! The earth certainly is not speeding up beyond its leisurely speed of 2.6 million km/hr around the Sun! So it is likely we have less time, with our minds occupied trying our best to progress in life. Astronomy will be even more hectic this year as we prepare different activities that can be conducted during 2009. Just last month the United Nations declared 2009 as the International Year of Astronomy. The skies this year will present the usual juicy choice cuts of planets, meteors, comets, eclipses, satellites and many more against the lively background of stars and constellations
The coming year will bring two lunar and two solar eclipses. The Annular Solar eclipse of 7th February and the Total Solar eclipse of 1st August occur too far away from us in the Polar Regions so we will not see any effect here. However we will be able to witness both lunar eclipses in Tanzania. The first one will be a Total Lunar eclipse which will begin close to 4 am on 21st February. By sunrise the moon will be coming out of the total phase. During the Partial Lunar eclipse of 16th August, 80 percent of the Moon will be covered up. We will be able to see the eclipse begin at a ‘convenient’ time of 10:35 pm until its end three hours later. The centre of this eclipse is just off the south eastern coast Tanzania so mid-eclipse will be at about ten minutes past midnight.
As for the visible planets, Mercury enters and leaves the morning and evening skies alternately several times during the year. Venus enters the evening sky in July and will remain an evening star for the next nine months. Mars will continue shining with brilliance until April having just reached opposition (closest to Earth) in December last year. It will be in the evening skies until September after which it will go into the morning sky. Jupiter will be back in the evening skies after May rising late but before midnight. By early July it will have reached opposition so after that it will be visible higher and higher in the sky each day at sunset. It will remain visible until early next year. Saturn is already in the late evening skies and will be at opposition on February 24th. After that it will remain in the evening skies until early September.
Mars may provide a spectacular sight if an obscure football field sized space rock hits the red planet on January 30th. The asteroid, called 2007WD5, was discovered last November. At the moment the asteroid is approaching Mars at nearly 45,000 km/hr and there is a very high (4 percent) chance of the rock hitting the red planet. Its effect would be similar to that which was experienced on Earth in the Tunguska strike in Siberia in 1908, which wiped out 60 million trees. There is no chance of this asteroid being veered off course by the Earth’s gravity and hitting us.
Among the spacecraft launched from Earth, Phoenix will reach and land on Mars by May 2008. It was launched in August 2007. The Messenger spacecraft will reach Mercury in January nearly four years after launch in August 2004. However this will be only the first of many flybys before the spacecraft settles into a final orbit in 2011. Satellites closer to home circling the Earth will continue to provide a daily dose of activity soon after sunset in the overhead skies where they appear as rapidly moving points of light.
In the night sky this month Mars rides high above the eastern horizon half way up the sky at sunset. Tiny Mercury will peek up the western horizon against the dazzle of sunset. It will attain a very high altitude of nearly 19 degrees above the horizon at sunset on 22nd January. So there is a very good chance to view this fleeting planet since it sets only after 8 pm. On 9th January, Mercury will be close to within 1 degree of the New Moon at an altitude of 13 degrees above the horizon at sunset. On 22nd Mercury will also be very close to Neptune (to within a quarter degree – less than a small finger apart), so you can locate Neptune for viewing through a telescope. Mercury will slide back down quickly after this and become invisible by the end of the month. Saturn can be seen from the last week of January, rising at 9 pm on 23rd.
Moon and Mars come together in the east to within 4 degrees (one palm-width apart) on 19th January. On 24th the Moon will be close to Saturn by a similar amount, rising together in the east at 9 pm. New Moon is on 8th January, First Quarter on 15th, Full Moon on 22nd and Last Quarter on 30th January.
For early risers, the early morning also offers exciting planet views at the end of this month. On 1st February Jupiter and Venus will be very close to within half a degree (a finger apart). On 4th February the pair will be joined by the crescent Moon to form an obtuse triangle with Jupiter in the middle.
The stars that adorn the January night skies include two of brightest stars in the whole sky, Sirius and Canopus marked B and A respectively on the map. The other brightest stars are: C - Procyon, D and E are Rigel and Beltelgeuse in Orion constellation, while F is Aldebaran in the Taurus constellation. Beltelgeuse and Aldebaran are red giants which are stars that are in the final stages of their lives. G is Capella and I is Achernar. Canopus is a star well removed from other bright stars so it is often used by spacecraft on route to the outer planets. Six of these stars (A, B, C, D, G and I) are among the top ten brightest stars in the sky so go out and know your stars. The Milky Way contains a dense collection of stars and interstellar dust and nebulae stretching across the sky from the southeast across the sky to the north. It grazes Sirius, Orion and Taurus, finally enclosing Perseus and Cassiopeia in the north.
Three visible galaxies can be seen in the early night sky for the next few months. Two of these, the Large Magellanic Cloud (LMC) and the Small Magellanic Cloud (SMC) are members of our local group which form a trio together with our Milky Way galaxy. The two Magellanic Cloud galaxies can be seen only in the southern skies since they are so close to the South Pole. They both have irregular shape and cover a wide area of the sky with more than 4 to 5 degrees of angular width (palm width). LMC lies between Canopus and the South Pole and can best be viewed after 9 p.m. The SMC which is 3½ degrees across lies between Achernar and the South. These two galaxies are about 50,000 light years away from us. The Andromeda galaxy can be seen in the north above Cassiopeia. It is more than 2 million light years away from us and can be seen as a fuzzy patch of light, making it the farthest object seen with the naked eyes.
This month the International Space Station (ISS) will be seen most easily on 22nd January (on Full Moon day) between 7:20 and 7:30 pm. It will rise from southwest and reach a maximum altitude of more than 70 degrees. Another interesting satellite, the Hubble Space Telescope (HST) will be seen on four consecutive days, in the evenings daily from 18th to 22nd between 7:55 to 8:05 pm. It will rise in the western skies with its starting position shifting slowly every day from northwest to slightly south of west. On 18th the HST will rise to an altitude of 70 degrees making it easy to pick out. After crossing three quarters of the sky it will disappear from view when it goes into the Earth’s shadow. On the remaining four days HST will appear lower and closer to the horizon.
Another remarkable observation of satellites is provided by the Iridium communication satellites. They have shiny 2 m x 1 m wide solar panels that reflect sunlight which makes them visible in daylight. This month you can follow two such sights on 14th and 22nd January. On 14th it will be visible at 7:30 in the morning in the east north east direction high in the sky at an altitude of 77 degrees above the horizon. On the 22nd it will be seen at 5:30 in the evening in the west north west at a height of 73 degrees.
All satellite observation timing can be updated and reconfirmed at the Heavens-above site www.heavens-above.com. First log in your geographic position, for example for Dar es Salaam, enter 6 degrees south latitude and 39 degrees east longitude.
On 20th December 2007 the United Nations passed a resolution to make 2009 the International Year of Astronomy (IYA 2009). 2009 marks the 400th anniversary the first observation of planets by Galileo. The year will promote the contribution of astronomy to society and culture with emphasis on education and public involvement especially by young people. It will be celebrated throughout the world with activities at global, regional and national levels. I would like to call upon all those who are interested in giving ideas, organizing activities or contributing in any way they can to make IYA 2009 a great success, especially for Tanzania and Africa, to please contact me at ntjiwaji@yahoo.com. I will be posting information and updates on the IYA 2009 web page http://www.astronomy2009.org/content/view/239/42/