European Association for Astronomy Education

Source: Astronomy Magazine

Venus & Mercury at dusk on the 6th of January.
Image credits: Derek Rowley.

Mercury reaches greatest elongation on 14th of January, when it lies 19° east of the Sun and hangs 10° above the southwestern horizon a half-hour after sunset. Although the innermost planet glows brightly, at magnitude –0.7, the easiest way to find it is to look 1.3° to the right of brilliant Venus. Binoculars will show you the pair best. When viewed through a telescope, Mercury appears 7" across and slightly more than half-lit.

Use brilliant Venus as a guide to its fainter companion Mercury on the 14th of January.

Source: NASA Science Casts - YouTube

Mercury, Venus and Jupiter are lining up for a beautiful sunset conjunction at the end of May.

Source: NASA Science Casts

June nights usually mark the beginning of great weather for observations in southern European countries but very short nights in northern countries. On clear nights out of towns, in places where the sky is dark, you can see anywhere up to about 1,500 to 2, 000 stars, depending on your age and your eyesight. of course light pollution is a problem and if you are in city you will see much less.

This month's greatest feature is the lunar eclipse. There will also be two partial solar eclipses but they will only be seen on polar regions. In Europe only Northern most Norway, Sweden and Finland might have a glimpse of the June 1st eclipse. The July 1st solar eclipse will only be seen close to the South Pole.

The lunar eclipse will be happening on June 15th there will be a full Moon and a total lunar eclipse! We'll get a good view across Europe because the Moon starts to move into the Earth's shadow in early evening so this will be great for observations even with children.

The first lunar eclipse of 2011 occurs at the Moon's ascending node in southern Ophiuchus about 7° west of the Lagoon Nebula (M8). The Moon passes deeply through Earth's umbral shadow during this rather long event. The total phase itself lasts 100 minutes. The last eclipse to exceed this duration was in July 2000. The Moon's contact times with Earth's umbral and penumbral shadows are listed below.

• Penumbral Eclipse Begins: 17:24:34 UT
• Partial Eclipse Begins: 18:22:56 UT
• Total Eclipse Begins: 19:22:30 UT
• Greatest Eclipse: 20:12:37 UT
• Total Eclipse Ends: 21:02:42 UT
• Partial Eclipse Ends: 22:02:15 UT
• Penumbral Eclipse Ends: 23:00:45 UT

Click on the image to see a complete information sheet about the eclipse by Fred Espenak.

When totality begins the moon is expected to take on a reddish glow. It's a stunning sight and yep, you can look directly at it with no problem of hurting your eyes. It will be fun to take some pictures. If you want to, you can send them to us and we will publish them on our website.

It is now possible to see summer constellations, so you can try and find Scorpius. Lying near the centre of the Milky Way and rising in the east is really the only zodiac constellation that  does, in fact, look like its namesake, the giant constellation of Scorpius or the 'Scorpion.'

It's one of the easiest constellations to pick out as it's also one of the few that does look like what it's supposed to represent. Now, look for the red heart of the Scorpion, the star known as Antares. It's a red giant star that is hundreds of times bigger than our Sun!

Scorpius is a fabulous part of the sky to scan with a pair of binoculars. You can easy globular clusters (M4) and open clusters (M6 and M7) just using a pair of binoculars in a dark place.

In June it is also possible to observe the Solar System's brightest planets. The eastern morning sky in June is dominated by two very bright planets, and they are, of course, Venus and Jupiter. After sunset use your telescope or borrow a friend's to look at the planet Saturn high in the north. You should be able to see those magnificent rings just opening up.

Links:
Fred Espenak's Eclipse Page for NASA

Source: NASA

Jupiter (left) and Mercury (right) photographed at sunset on March 13, 2011.
Image credit: Pete Lawrence of Selsey, UK

This week, sky watchers have a rare opportunity to see Mercury at its best as NASA's MESSENGER probe prepares to enter orbit around the innermost planet. (read more)



Children from St Cronans Stargazers draw moon phases

The Big Moon Ball Project – A work in progress

The Moon? The Moon? How on Earth do you explain the Moon to small children?  In many other talks I had done so in graphic from and with images but wanted to try something different. I figured I would have a go at an interactive workshop in a field, as one would of course.

Made me a Moon ball and put it on a stand, borrowed a super two million candle torch, put it on a stand.  Then I invited my new astronomy group St Cronans Stargazers to join me at our usual place.  As it was midterm a small but smiling group turned up, perfect for a first run!  We pretended the torch was the sun and the children were the Earth and I became the Moon.  For the first orbit of the Earth I spoke about the phase they see from the Earth as they looked at me (the Moon Ball) moving from New to First Quarter, then Full, then Last Quarter, then back to New.

The children got the idea very quickly as the sun (torch) illuminated the phases while they (the Earth) turned in unison in the field at the end of my road. The Big Moon Ball beamed the moons phases into their eyes.  Clip boards and paper were provided for the second orbit of the Earth .The children sketched the four main Moon phases as they happened and wrote down the names. The parents were very helpful, standing at the points of the phases and also helping the children see their clipboards and their drawings in the dark.

Of course this workshop would be so much more powerful if the Moon was in the sky at the same time. I am continuing to develop the activity; it suits the Irish cloudy sky syndrome and is also an indoor workshop.  Every child wanted to hold the Moon Ball and help put it in the car afterwards. A whole bunch of fun was over in a blink the children had lovely practical drawings for their folders, and were on their way to understanding the Moons movements.

The Big Moon Ball Project was welcomed by Engineers Ireland as part of Engineers Week Ireland
Huge thanks to my husband Bernard for help with the sun and for taking the photographs.
The Moon Ball is getting an upgrade, the far side is being painted in now and the near side is developing more details, craters, rays and mountains.  More images on my website here

Cool News /  Hot Stuff

NASA Solar System Exploration Page I am really delighted and honoured to have  my Solar Dynamics Observatory  inspired painting on the site for the month of March ,check it out. !!

Deirdre Kelleghan

Submitted by Veselka Radeva, Ph.D.
Original post by Constance E. Walker, Ph.D.

With half of the world’s population now living in cities, many urban dwellers have never experienced the wonderment of pristinely dark skies and maybe never will. This loss, caused by light pollution, is a concern on many fronts: safety, energy conservation, cost, health and effects on wildlife, as well as our ability to view the stars. Even though light pollution is a serious and growing global concern, it is one of the easiest environmental problems you can address on local levels.

Participation in the international star-hunting campaign, GLOBE at Night, helps to address the light pollution issue locally as well as globally. This year, 2 sets of campaigns are being offered. For the first campaign from February 21 through March 6, 2011, everyone all over the world is invited to record the brightness of the night sky. The second campaign runs from March 22 through April 4 in the Northern Hemisphere and March 24 through April 6 in the Southern Hemisphere. The campaign is easy and fun to do. First, you match the appearance of the constellation Orion in the first campaign (and Leo or Crux in the second campaign) with simple star maps of progressively fainter stars found. Then you submit your measurements, including the date, time, and location of your comparison. After all the campaign’s observations are submitted, the project’s organizers release a map of light-pollution levels worldwide. Over the last five annual 2-week campaigns, volunteers from more than 100 nations contributed 52,000 measurements, one third of which came from last year’s campaign.

To learn the five easy steps to participate in the GLOBE at Night program, see the GLOBE at Night website. You can listen to last year’s 10-minute audio podcast on light pollution and GLOBE at Night. Or download a 45-minute powerpoint and accompanying audio. GLOBE at Night is also on Facebook and Twitter.

The big news is that children and adults can submit their measurements in real time if they have a smart phone or tablet. To do this, you can use the web application. With smart phones and tablets, the location, date and time are put in automatically. And if you do not have a smart phone or tablet, there are user-friendly tools on the GLOBE at Night report page to find latitude and longitude.

For activities that have children explore what light pollution is, what its effects are on wildlife and how to prepare for participating in the GLOBE at Night campaign, see the Dark Skies Rangers activities. Monitoring our environment will allow us as citizen-scientists to identify and preserve the dark sky oases in cities and locate areas where light pollution is increasing. All it takes is a few minutes during the 2011 campaign to measure sky brightness and contribute those observations on-line. Help us exceed the 17,800 observations contributed last year. Your measurements will make a world of difference.

Star Maps: http://www.globeatnight.org/observe_magnitude.html

Submitting Measurements: http://www.globeatnight.org/report.html

GLOBE at Night: http://www.globeatnight.org/

Audio Podcast: http://365daysofastronomy.org/2010/02/03/february-3rd-the-globe-at-night-campaign-our-light-or-starlight/

Powerpoint: http://www.globeatnight.org/files/NSN_GaN_2011_slides.ppt

Accompanying Audio: http://www.globeatnight.org/files/NSN_GaN_2011_audio.mp3

Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/GLOBEatNight

Twitter: http://twitter.com/GLOBEatNight

Web App for Reporting: http://www.globeatnight.org/webapp/

Dark Skies Activities: http://www.darkskiesawareness.org/DarkSkiesRangers/