texas

skywatchers report


Welcome to the University of Texas Skywatchers Report for Monday November 21 through Sunday November 27.

The new moon for the month of November is on Wednesday the 23 so we’ll have a waning crescent moon in the eastern pre-dawn skies for the first couple of days of the week and then we’ll have a waxing crescent moon in the western early evening skies for the remainder of the week.

Mercury and Venus are close to one another but are setting just half an hour after the sun so they are lost in the sun’s glare.

Saturn is up in the south-southwest at 7:00 p.m. and is setting a little after 11 p.m. by the end of the week.

Jupiter is up in the south-southeast at 7:00 p.m. and is setting at 2:15 a.m. at midweek.

Mars is rising at 6:30 p.m. and is at magnitude -1.7 and 17.1 arcseconds in size as it moves towards closest approach next week and opposition the week after.

Uranus and Neptune are also up in the evening skies, so with finder charts and a small telescope, you can see all of the planets from Mars outward right now.

In space anniversaries this week, Wednesday November 23 marks 45 years since the launch of Meteosat-1, part of the EUMETSAT organization’s geostationary satellite program. The satellite imaged the weather in three channels – visible, infrared, and water vapor – every half hour. The imager on Meteosat-1 failed two years after launch, but the satellite collected data through to 1984.

There will be no public viewing on UT campus telescope this week due to the Thanksgiving holiday and UT fall break.

Thank you for calling the University of Texas Skywatchers Report and have a happy and safe Thanksgiving holiday weekend.