h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Ok, Auriga's earmarked on the to-do list.

I'll put something together for the rest of it.

Deke

Done.

Deke

Great, I'll delete mine then

I got your email thanks, I'll reply as soon as Andrew's gone to school.

I was stargazing last night and for some time I've been wondering what this striking star is:
Plough, last star = eta UMa Alkaid - trace a straight line from that and turn ACW direction (point west from my perspective) eg from noon to 9pm. It's early evening, around 8pm. Wouldn't even see it if there were houses behind me, but it sits just between two bungalows and there are bungalows opposite them so I get a distant, if narrow, eyeline of the horizon. It sits alone...no surrounding stars to work out what it is or even what constellation it's in!
Any ideas?

I couldn't see anything at all tonight. 10/10 cloud but I'm not sure from your directions where you're pointing.

'ACW direction'.??

Extending the line off the end of the Plough's handle there's Arcturus in the East, but that's not up till well past 8pm.

Otherwise in the south-east,about that time, and quite low down is Saturn. It's just under Leo's sickle.

Deke

Sorry, ACW = anti-clockwise. You end up pointing west/north-west. It's not Saturn. I don't know how to find out
I don't find star maps easy to understand, especially with the right-left thinglooking at the constellations in my Atlas it could possibly be Draco or Bootes but how come I can only see one sparkling star? Is it because it's so low down? The others in the constellation are drowned out by light pollution, possibly.

is that the East according to star maps?

ACW, I should have realised.

>there's Arcturus in the East> is that the East according to star maps?<
Yes.

I’ve never found star maps particularly easy to get on with. You have to have a bit of a knack with them. I tend to use an star atlas if I want to check anything out. But if you mean the large round sort in the magazines, what you have to remember is that you don’t need to look at the whole thing at once. Invariably they have the whole sky with the north, south, east and west printed around the edges and you‘ve got to orientate yourself with it.

If you want to look for something in say, the northern aspect, you face the north and rotate the whole map so that the printed north is at the bottom, nearest you. That will place east to your right and west to your left. The knack comes from regarding the south, which is up over the top of your head and behind you. So that means that you can only use the bottom half of the printed map to check out what’s in front of you.

I’m lucky in that my back yard faces almost exactly south, and I got used to knowing that where the sun comes up on the left is east, and where it goes down is west. For me north/north east is toward the lights of Lunnon and pretty well useless all thro the year.

It is quite clear tonight and I’ve been having a look for the last half hour. Getting back to your star, if I drop a vertical line down from the tail end of the plough, and scan along about 20 deg above the horizon going left towards the west , the brightest star in that region is Deneb in Cygnus. But I couldn’t spot it tonight because it’s in my ‘wrong’ direction. You’re quite right though, that only the brightest stars are going to show through the murk when they are low towards the horizon.

Deke

I took my atlas out with me last night and decided it was Deneb in Cygnus

So the "Arc to Arcturus" thing, are we too north to see that? That's continuing the pan-handle downwards, right?

Glad we sorted that out then.

The Arc to Arcturus thing does, as you say, just point the way from the plough if you follow the curving line it makes, and extend it (in a curve) until you come to Arcturus. But at the moment, in the early evening the bear is standing on its tail and pointing vertically down to it below the horizon. It doesn’t rise until about 9.30 in the evening. Even then you probably won’t see it due to pollution ‘till it gets about 20 deg above it in the wee small hours.

Did you see the new(ish) moon tonight. It was showing the ashen light really well. The first quarter is always my favourite because of the massive and well formed craters you can see if you run a telescope down the terminator. Just delving into them always shows up something new. Each night it changes and a whole new bunch are illuminated. It is so spectacular, it never fails to please.

I’ve seen you popping up all over the place making corrections. Are you a Curator now as well?

Deke

Hi Deke, yes, I nipped my weekends washing into my garage (tumble drier's in there) and stopped short when spotting the gorgeous sliver...it was shrouded in mist and very low but still stunning, it was damned cold

I also love the newish moon my younger daughter called it the "Cheshire Cat" moon - that was her favourite scene in Alice in Wonderland when the cat disappeared

Yes, I've been granted Curator status, been adding links like the clappers and tweaking entries, I may never leave the house again

Right, I went out at 6pm as soon as I saw my star I started mapping things and came back in and looked it up. It's Vega, in Lyra. I swear it shines about 6 different colours in the binos. Just above Lyra was a multiple star system I just looked it up and it's epsilon Lyrae, a double binary system.

I swung my binos up to seek out Polaris and at 6:40 a meteorite flew across in the direction of the moon. SHWOOSH! I was so surprised I almost dropped the binos. Lucky I had the strap round my neck eh?

I have also noted a red triangle: Aldebaran, down to Betelgeuse, then up to Mars, back to Aldebaran. Pity it's not fixed, really!

For some reason Cepheus was really prominent tonight, considering how misty it was lower down, there was a lovely ring around the moon, which was incredibly bright I picked out a lot of the craters, as you said earlier.

<> = Just above Vega

Stars do twinkle more, and with more intense colours the closer they are to the horizon. It's just an optical thing. At least you'll be able to track it as it gets higher in the sky as the year goes on. There's nothing quite like that to get an appreciation of the mechanics of it all. I always find it a bit of a facer to realise that those stars have been doing much the same thing since before anyone was here to appreciate it.

The past few nights I've been out and I've seen several meteorites, usually just out of the corner of my eye. Is there a shower at the moment?

Moon's up again, that's the third night in a row I've had some really good views. Orion is just in the right place for me at the moment. It's so clear I'm actualy able to see the Great Nebula with the naked eye. That's rather unusual around my way.

Deke

http://meteorshowersonline.com/february_radiants.html

It was really misty here the last two evenings but very clear overhead, I have a spectacular view of the Winter Triangle and Orion from my kitchen window and it always seems strange to look out a few hours later to see how they've moved. Sirius is the first star I see every night. It hangs at the end of the road opposite me, where there are no houses, so I'm extremely lucky from a vantage point. And my back garden is very dark, street lights drowned out by my bungalow.

There must have been something odd going on last night. On the way into work this morning there were reports on local radio news of 'bright meteorites' seen last night over London. One guy even reported it was bright enough to light up the room he was looking from.

The ones I have seen were quite bright but I just took them to be sporadic ones.

May be worth another look tonight if it's clear.

Deke

Meteorites over London?

What I mean is, if they can be seen by Londoners then they must be bright, last April the only thing I could see in the night sky over London was Venus.

The BBC observing notes for this month have nothing: http://www.bbc.co.uk/science/space/myspace/nightsky/observingnotes.shtml

I wonder if it's a new shower?

I've been out and it's gorgeous out there
Clear although the is very bright, should still spot any meteors later

Well somebody saw enough to report it to a radio station. Probably more like a bit of satellite debris re-entering.

I don't think it's the showers in the link, unless we've suddenly passed through a thick bit. It's cloudt at the moment but I'll have another look later if it clears.

Deke

It's cold... but it's clear.

I stood around for about a half hour and caught one fairly faint trace. I was about to give up when one of the largest fireballs I've ever seen occurred at about 10.35. It was rather orange in colour and quite slow giving out a burning tail like a sparkler firework, rather like some of the Perseids.

It was travelling between the lower part of the Plough and finished up at the base of the sickle in Leo.

It was seriously spectacular.

Deke