texas

skywatchers report


Welcome to the University of Texas Skywatchers Report for Monday February 14th to Sunday February 20th.

The moon is full on Wednesday the 16th so we’ll start the week with a waxing gibbous moon and then we’ll have a waning gibbous moon for the remainder of the week. The full moon for February is known as the Snow Moon, Wolf Moon, and the Hunger Moon.

Jupiter is still hanging on as the sole planet visible to the unaided eye in our evening skies, but it is now setting a little less than an hour after the sun and will soon be lost in the sun’s glare.

Over in the morning skies, Venus is shining high in the southeast in the pre-dawn skies and is rising at 4:30 a.m. this week. Mars is to the lower right of Venus and is rising at 4:50 a.m.

Mercury is at its greatest elongation on Wednesday and is rising at 5:45 a.m., almost an hour and a half before sunrise, so this is a good time to try to spot it if you’re an early riser.

Saturn is emerging from conjunction and is rising at 6:30 a.m. at midweek.

In space anniversaries this week, Sunday February 20th marks 60 years since the launch of John Glenn on his Mercury Program spaceflight aboard the capsule Friendship 7. This was the third human-crewed US spaceflight and the first American flight to orbit the Earth. Alan Shepard and Gus Grissom’s flights the previous year had been sub-orbital missions. Glenn’s flight was originally planned to go for at least seven orbits, but a strange sensor reading caused the mission to be cut short at only three orbits. Glenn safely splashed down in the North Atlantic and was recovered, along with the capsule, by the USS Noa.

And 45 years ago on February 18th, the Space Shuttle prototype, named Enterprise after a writing campaign by Star Trek fans, had its first test flight. This test was performed while mated to a 747 airplane that had been modified to be a Space Shuttle carrier and did not have a crew aboard. Enterprise never actually went into space, but it was a crucial part of the testing processes that lead to the first flight into space by the Shuttle Columbia in 1981. The Enterprise was on display at the National Air and Space Museum Udvar-Hazy Center until it was transferred to the Intrepid Sea, Air & Space Museum in New York in 2012.

Public viewing on UT campus telescopes is due to resume next week. Please check our website – outreach.as.utexas.edu – and this recording next week for more information on days and times.

Thank you for calling the University of Texas Skywatchers Report.