STAR GAZER
THE INTERNATIONAL EDITION
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Horkheimer: Greetings, greetings fellow star gazers.
In addition to all the holiday gift gifting going on, December
will be gifting us with several goodies from the cosmos. Because
December is one of those peculiar months which will have two full
moons, one of which will be on New Year's Eve. Plus two wonderful
planets will share opposite sides of the sky before midnight.
And what may be the best meteor shower of the year, the Geminids,
will give us something to ooh and aah about. Let me show you.
O.K., we've got our skies set up for next Tuesday December 1st just after sunset where you will see an almost, just a few hours away from full, Moon rising, which according to some American natives is called the full cold Moon. It will slowly travel up the sky and reach its highest point around midnight. And as it slowly starts to descend it will officially turn full Tuesday morning at 2:30 a.m. Eastern Time and will finally set at sunrise. Full moon number two will occur on new year's eve Thursday December 31st. Called the Long Night Moon, because the hours of darkness are always longest at this time of year in the northern hemisphere, it will also rise just after sunset and be visible in the sky all night long, reaching its highest point around midnight, and will be super high and will look almost like a floodlight attached to the top of the sky illuminating the landscape below as we ring in the New Year. And if there's snow the scene at midnight will be absolutely dazzling.
The next dates I'd like you to mark down are late evening Sunday Dec. 13th and midnight to dawn Monday the 14th when the annual Geminid meteor shower may be the best of the year. Interestingly, unlike all other meteor showers which are usually better after midnight, the Geminid meteor shower is frequently good before midnight. But like all meteor showers, the longer you stay out, the more meteors you'll see.
And now for you planet aficionados, you'll have two really good ones to choose from before midnight. To see the first simply look toward the west just after sunset and you'll see dazzlingly bright, king of the planets, 88,000 mile wide Jupiter, eleven times the width of our planet Earth which is always fun to see through even the smallest of telescopes because you can watch four of his largest moons as they change place in orbit around the planet hour after hour. And as Jupiter sets in late evening you can turn around and face east and between 10 and 11 you'll see the 4,000 mile wide rouge gold planet Mars rising. And Mars is the one to watch because it is zooming closer and closer to us every single day. And will be brighter each successive night. In fact it will grow almost two times brighter from December 1st to the 31st. So trace the progress of Mars and Jupiter this month, watch the Geminid meteor shower on the 13th and 14th and bathe under the light of two full Moons in one month's time. Cosmic goodies indeed. Keep looking up!
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Horkheimer: Cosmic goodies fill December's skies. There'll be two full Moons this December, the first next week on December 1st and 2nd and another on New Year's Eve. Plus there are two planets you really must watch. After sunset face southwest and it will beg you to look at it through a small telescope and watch its four moons waltz around it. Look east after 11 p.m. and you can watch the red planet Mars grow brighter every single night until it reaches super brightness on January 29th. Plus next week Sunday evening the 13th and Monday morning the 14th the annual Geminid meteor shower may be the best of the year. What a month, two full Moons, two bright planets and a meteor shower that just may knock your socks off. Keep looking up!
How did you like this episode?
Please give us your comments. (Click
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* This week's Sky At A Glance
and Planet Roundup from Sky & Telescope.Starry Night Deluxe was used to produce this episode
of Star Gazer
![[SmilinJack]](jack1sm.jpg)
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