Fwd: December Sky Happenings - rocket launches, meteor showers, and other sky stuff

[Garrett Cooper]

Sent from my iPhone

Begin forwarded message:

From: Indy <indy....@gmail.com>
Date: December 3, 2014 at 5:32:28 PM EST
To: undisclosed-recipients:;
Subject: December Sky Happenings - rocket launches, meteor showers, and other sky stuff

Hey, everyone,

Been a bit since I last sent anything out, since the terminal failure of the Antares rocket some weeks ago. I haven't learned much more new that you probably haven't already heard in the news, but Orbital is going ahead with the investigation, and plans to resume launches once again after they've resolved all the issues.

In other space launch news, this month is kinda historic in that there are no less than six different countries ALL launching rockets! (that would be all six of the countries in the world which have space launch capabilities). These include the USA, Russia, Japan, China, Europe (France, from French Guiana), and India. (you can see a full listing of what's coming up here: http://spaceflightnow.com/launch-schedule/) Of these, the first was yesterday, when the Japanese successfully launched their Hayabusa 2 asteroid sample return mission. Tomorrow morning, NASA (i.e., USA) will be launching the test flight of the Orion spacecraft, sometime between 7:05am and 9:44am. When this is launched with astronauts aboard, they will travel further from Earth than anyone has since the Apollo missions. If you want to follow along, some links:

Spaceflight Now’s mission status page:
http://spaceflightnow.com/2014/12/03/orion-eft1-mission-status-center/

Orion first flight multimedia from NASA
http://www.nasa.gov/externalflash/orionfirstflight/

Mission Timeline:
http://spaceflightnow.com/2014/11/19/orion-exploration-flight-test-no-1-timeline/

Moving away from the space launch stuff, this month, if you are motivated to get out in the cold, you can have an opportunity to catch a glimpse of all five of the naked-eye visible planets! Mars is hanging low in the southwest after sunset for most of the month, setting around 8pm. At the end of the month, Venus and Mercury will be low to the southwest as well. On New Year's Eve they will only a couple of finger widths apart in the sky. For the next few months into 2015 Venus will climb higher and higher into the evening sky, so you'll have a bright, shiny jewel to watch on those winter evening drives home. :-)  As for Saturn and Jupiter, Saturn now rises about an hour or so before the Sun (which means you have to be up in the wee hours to see it). Jupiter, however, is kinda dominating the night sky right now, rising around 10pm at the beginning of the month, and 8pm by the end of the month. It'll be that bright starlike object to the East, and will continue to dominate the night sky through January.

Capping off the month of sky observing opportunities, the Geminid Meteor Shower peaks in just about a week and a half! The Geminids is considered by many to be the best of the meteor showers (yes, even surpassing the vaunted Perseids), producing up to 120 multicolored meteors per hour at its peak. The meteors are debris left behind by an asteroid known as 3200 Phaethon, which was discovered back in 1982. The shower runs annually from December 7-17, although it apparently has already started dropping rocks in our atmosphere, as there have been reports of bright meteors and a few fireballs earlier this week from the shower. So it's starting early. :-)  It will peak on the night of the 13th and morning of the 14th (woo! over a weekend! not the middle of the week!). The not quite 3rd quarter moon will drown out some of the meteors, but the Geminids are overall so bright and numerous that it should still be a good show. Best viewing will be from a dark location after midnight. Meteors will radiate from the constellation Gemini, but can appear anywhere in the sky. If you plan on going out to observe this shower, dress for the weather!! And assume the temperatures will be a good 10-20 degrees COLDER than the forecasted low, and dress accordingly (gloves, hat, parka, thermals, etc). You'll be happier.  :-)  (having a mug of hot chocolate is helpful, too).

For those who haven't seen it yet, here is one sequence from some astro-lapses I shot during the 2012 Geminids, covering a period of 2-1/2 hours, and therein are no fewer than 30 meteors (and while I was shooting this, meteors were falling all over the sky outside the camera field of view) : https://vimeo.com/55675094

If you want to get more info on the Geminids, google "geminid meteor shower 2014" and you'll be treated to a host of pages.  :-)

Mk