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Happy Easter! Celestial Events in April
🕑 Added 2021-04-05 03:57:51 +0000 UTCHello and a happy Easter to all who celebrate it!
April is deep in the heart of "Galaxy Season", since te Orion spur sets too early to do any kind of meaningful observations with it, and the milky way core doesn't rise until the wee hours of the morning. That means when you look up at night, you are looking away from our home galaxy and out into deep space! Unfortunately if you've been following along with my posts lately you'll know that I have had some issues with my mounts, and as a result haven't been able to shoot any of the galaxies yet this season. Huge bummer. However, with some dark skies and a camera, I can still come up with something (and of course there is always the sun and the moon to look at!)
Quiet month, but here's a quick overview of events regardless:
April 12th- New Moon
Always the best time to go stargazing- this is the darkest night of the month. While you'll have to wait until the wee hours of the morning to see the milky way and with it most of the nebulae it contains, if you have a decent pair of binoculars (or better yet- a telescope) you can go galaxy hunting! They are VERY hard to find visually, but by star hopping and with patience you can find them. My observing challenge for you this new moon is the pair of galaxies, Bode's Galaxy and the Cigar galaxy (m81 & m82). They are near the "ladle" portion of the big dipper. You'll look for very faint "fuzzy" spots. Once you've spotted them, they're unmistakeable!
April 17th- Occult of Mars
Observers in most of central and eastern Africa, the southern parts of the Middle East, India, Southeast Asia, Indonesia, and most of the Philippines can see the moon pass in front of (or occult) Mars. For everyone else, it's just a nice little conjunction of the red planet and the crescent moon.
April 20th- First Quarter Moon
Always a favorite phase, this is the best time to observe crater detail on the moon. It is high in the sky right at sunset, so easy time to take out a pair of binoculars and try and see the craters along the "terminator"- the area where shadows are longest where the light meets the dark.
April 22/23- Lyrids Meteor Shower
This shower actually lasts a week but peaks on this evening/morning. Sadly this is happening with a bright gibbous moon nearby, so it will be hard to see all but the brightest meteors.
April 27th- Supermoon
The moon at it's fullest and closest! This moon will be bright enough to cast shadows, and as a "supermoon" (at perigee) will also be about 20% larger than when it is at its apogee. Full moons always rise on the opposite side of, and te same time as the sunset. So these are easy to observe rising, and always a wonderful site to see rising on the horizon. This moon is known as the "Pink" moon, since it coincides with pink flower blooms in spring!
PS- sorry this was late. April really snuck up on me this year!
