Go north for the brightest of lights
WE are now moving towards the minimum of the Solar Cycle.
Sunspots decline and the Sun produces less of the outbursts of radiation that cause aurora – the Northern Lights.
The aurora can still occur though when the Sun is in its quieter phase.
April is often a favoured month for aurora and websites such as Spaceweather.com give predictions of how far south the aurora is likely to be seen each night.
Displays seen from Scotland are surprisingly common and the further north you are boosts your chances of seeing it.
The Spring should have several comets within range of larger binoculars and telescopes and it’s always possible that a comet may flare up and become bright enough to be seen with the naked eye. The best observable comet at present is called 41P/Tuttle-Giacobini-Kresak and is quite well placed during the evening and high up in the north-eastern sky.
The planet Jupiter will reach its best this weekend, when it will be at opposition – directly opposite the Sun from our point of view – at a distance of 400million miles from the Earth.
When due south toward midnight, it will be about 30 degrees above the horizon so will provide reasonable views in a telescope.
The Moon will pass close by to Jupiter on Monday night, when the two objects will appear only a degree apart.
The orbit of the Moon around the Earth is obvious from one night to the next as it moves toward the East, further to the left each night.
But that orbital motion is far less obvious from hour to hour.
The Moon is so bright it drowns out most of the stars in the sky.
However, Jupiter is bright enough to act as a reference point in the sky so that on the night of the 10th it may be easy to see the Moon slowing shifting to the left over a few hours. It actually appears to move approximately its own width every hour.
Remember that the Lyrid meteor shower takes place around April 22, is quite well placed this year and, if the weather is clear, conditions should be favourable to see several meteors. As their name suggests, this meteor shower appears to radiate from near the constellation of Lyra, which contains the bright star Vega. The best time to look will be from about 10pm onwards when Vega will be bright and obvious above the eastern horizon.
The Lyrids are a shower usually of medium activity, with perhaps 15-20 meteors per hour visible under good conditions.
We’ll continue to see the rapid advance of daylight this month, with the Sun setting closer to 8.30pm by the end of the month (and twilight ending even later) making astronomy much more of a challenge.