Welcome to the University of Texas Skywatchers Report for Monday August 18th through Sunday August 24th.
The new moon for the month of August is early in the morning of Saturday the 23rd so we’ll have a waning crescent moon in the pre-dawn skies for most of the week, and then we’ll have a very thin waxing crescent moon in the early evening skies for the weekend.
Mars is still low in the west-southwest at sunset and is setting at 10 p.m. this week.
Over in the east, Saturn and Neptune are rising at 9:35 p.m. as they both head towards opposition in the latter half of September.
Closer to dawn, Jupiter is rising at 3:40 a.m., and Venus follows at 4:25 a.m. Look for the thin crescent moon alongside Venus on Wednesday morning.
Mercury is at greatest elongation on Tuesday morning when it will rise at 5:35 a.m., almost an hour and a half before the sun. The very thin crescent moon will be to the upper left of Mercury on Thursday morning.
In space anniversaries this week, Wednesday August 20th marks 50 years since the launch of the Viking 1 combined orbiter and lander mission to Mars. Viking 1 entered orbit around Mars on June 19, 1976, and the lander touched down on July 20, the first successful Mars landing, which also occurred on the 7th anniversary of the first humans setting foot on the moon. The orbiter’s mission ended in August 1980 and the last contact with the Viking 1 lander was in November 1982 after operating for over six years on the Martian surface.
There will be no public viewing this summer on the UT campus telescopes so we can do maintenance and repairs. We expect to resume the regular viewing schedule in the Fall 2025 semester.
While you’re waiting for Austin-area telescope viewing to resume, you can tune in to McDonald Observatory live streams from west Texas. You can view past events on the McDonald Observatory YouTube channel and you can follow the observatory on social media and at McDonaldObservatory.org to be notified of future events.
Thank you for calling the University of Texas Skywatchers Report.
