What's in the sky tonight?
September 23, 2013
-Altair shines due south very high after dark. It's the leading light of the constellation Aquila, the Eagle. Off the tail of Aquila lies the Scutum Star Cloud, with the grand open cluster M11 just below the dark nebula Barnard 111.
-Comet ISON is falling toward the sun for a close encounter on Thanksgiving Day 2013. If it survives, it could become one of the finest comets in years. At the moment ISON is still far away and faint, but its sunward velocity is impressive--more than 72,000 mph on Sept. 22nd.
Alberto Quijano Vodniza of Pasto, Narino, Colombia, obtained the 35-minute video on Sept 22nd. "The motion of the comet was clearly visible," he says. "I used a 14-inch Celestron telescope and a STL-1001E SBIG camera." The video can be found here:
http://spaceweather.com/gallery/indi...pload_id=86998
Comet ISON is now approaching Mars in the eastern sky before sunrise. On Oct. 1st it will fly past the Red Planet at a distance on only 0.07 AU. Mars satellites and rovers are in position to snap the first close-up pictures of the comet.
Astro Picture of the Day:
September 23, 2013
Source:
South of Antares, in the tail of the nebula-rich constellation Scorpius, lies emission nebula IC 4628. Nearby hot, massive stars, millions of years young, radiate the nebula with invisible ultraviolet light, stripping electrons from atoms. The electrons eventually recombine with the atoms to produce the visible nebular glow, dominated by the red emission of hydrogen. At an estimated distance of 6,000 light-years, the region shown is about 250 light-years across, spanning an area equivalent to four full moons on the sky. The nebula is also cataloged as Gum 56 for Australian astronomer Colin Stanley Gum, but seafood-loving astronomers might know this cosmic cloud as The Prawn Nebula.