If you are celebrating Earth Day April 22, consider staying up late to watch for the Lyrid Meteors that night. They are not typically a showy display. But, there have been a few occasions in the past where hundreds per hour were witnessed. This video from ScienceAtNASA tells about it.
In case you missed it last month…
Maybe you were one of the fortunate ones last month to see the July Supermoon. My blog post explained quite a bit about it. There were news stories, images, and streaming webcams covering it. It was hyped as a big deal. For some of us, it was.
Well, here we go again. There is another even bigger Supermoon this month on August 10. It will be the biggest perigee full-moon of 2014.
Mark your calendar. Watch for it in an evening sky near you.
Science @ NASA
PS: There is yet another coming in September. You will have another chance if your skies are cloudy.
It’s time again for the Supermoon. This post is for those who will have clear skies on the evening of July 11 or 12 and want to see the Moon closer and bigger than normal. Full moon is actually at about sunrise on July 12 when it is setting in the west for those of us in the U.S. Most people don’t notice it setting full. The view of it at evening moonrise, before or after full, will appear almost exactly as it does at moonset the morning of full.
First, a little sciency stuff. This won’t hurt a bit.
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On September 12, 2013, noted climate scientist and showman Mike Huckabee reported that the melting of the Arctic ice must be over. He jokingly chided the scientific efforts to study the problem of global warming and sea ice melting. In his dismissive facebook report, he made several claims, none of which were substantiated with any evidence or links to it. He says…
Well, we’re coming to the end of the summer of 2013. So what’s it like up in Santa land? It’s freezing. The Arctic ice cap has grown by 60 percent in one year. There are almost a million more square miles of ocean covered with ice than there were last year.
What is the truth? You won’t find it in his social media status update. You will find it in the report of the National Snow & Ice Data Center. Yes, there is more sea ice in 2013…
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See video of this rare event.
I received an email notice earlier in the week from CalSky about the upcoming visible passes of the International Space Station for my location. Contact me or comment below if you would like to set up your own email notices. Normally, the passes are during the evening after sunset or in the morning before sunrise. This week’s notice included a special event. The ISS was going to pass in front of the Sun along a 5 mile wide path across this part of Iowa. The centerline was to be very near me. It was to occur Saturday August 17 at 5:33:26 CDT. I contacted a couple of friends and told them about it. One of them who lived nearby agreed to meet me at the local school yard.
Bob and I met and quickly set up my video camera on the tripod. I had started a countdown timer on my iPod…
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The week ahead of May 24 -31 promises some wonderful views of a rare event, a triple conjunction of Venus, Mercury, and Jupiter in the evening sky. Look to the west soon after sunset at 8:30 or later. This is the view for May 24th. I hope your skies are clear.
Mercury orbits closest to the Sun, it has a fast orbit. Venus is next closest and less fast. Earth is also moving. Jupiter plods along taking much longer to orbit in it’s huge path. Because of the movement of each planetary body, the view of the conjunction each evening will change a little. Here is May 25th.
Images for the next six evenings are in the rest of the post. So, if your skies are cloudy one evening, don’t fret. This show will be prominent for the entire week. You ought to be able to see it on several of the evenings.
Our View From Iowa 