{"id":463,"date":"2019-09-28T00:00:35","date_gmt":"2019-09-28T00:00:35","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.skycaramba.com\/monthly\/?p=463"},"modified":"2020-10-01T03:43:44","modified_gmt":"2020-10-01T03:43:44","slug":"october-2019","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.skycaramba.com\/monthly\/october-2019\/","title":{"rendered":"October 2019"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

A thin, crescent\nmoon greets us in the western sky at dusk when October starts. See\nAntares and Jupiter in the southwest and Saturn in the south. Venus\nand Mercury are evening object, too. But they’re barely there,\nsetting almost as soon as the sun does.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

The\nmoon passes by Antares in the claws of Scorpius on the 2nd<\/sup>.\nIt passes Jupiter on the 3rd<\/sup>\nand Saturn on the 5th<\/sup>.\nFor observers in the southern Atlantic Ocean and southern Africa,\nSaturn is occulted. The moon is just past first quarter then.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

After\nfull moon on the 13th<\/sup>,\nwatch for the moon to pass through Taurus. It will pass by Aldebaran\nin the V of the Hyades on the 17th<\/sup>.\nThe moon, about a day before last quarter, passes in front of the\nstar Tejat in the feet of Gemini on the 19th<\/sup>\nfor viewers in south Asia. A waning crescent passes by Regulus on the\nmorning of the 23rd<\/sup>.\nAnd a very thin crescent will be near Mars on the morning of the\n26th<\/sup>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n
\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Specific\ndates on the moon’s phases this month: first quarter on the 5th<\/sup>,\nfull on the 13th<\/sup>,\nlast quarter on the 21st<\/sup>,\nand new moon on the 28th<\/sup>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Lunistice\nis on the 5th<\/sup>\nwhen the moon is 22.8\u00b0 south of the equator. The moon goes north of\nthe equator on the 13th<\/sup>.\nIt reaches 22.9\u00b0 north on the 20th<\/sup>.\nAnd it’s on the equator going south on the 26th<\/sup>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Apogee\non the 10th<\/sup>\nhas the moon 405,900 km away. Perigee on the 26th<\/sup>\nis at 361,300 km.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

October presents\nseveral meteor showers:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The\nSouthern Taurids peak on the 10th<\/sup>.\nThe moon is nearly full that night. But don’t be disappointed. This\nshower’s peak is so broad, you can see the meteors weeks before and\nafter. They tend to be slow and few, with a peak around 5 per hour.\nBut this shower is known to produce a few fireballs. And really, you\ncan look for them from the middle of September to the middle of\nNovember. The parent comet is 2P\/Encke.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

During\nthe Orionids peak on the 21st<\/sup>,\nthe moon is at last quarter. It will give some interference, since\nit’s up in the morning when Orion is high. Expect 10 to 20 meteors\nper hour. They move somewhat fast. The parent comet is 1P\/Halley.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Other,\nminor, showers to try your luck with are the Draconids on the 9th<\/sup>,\nthe Delta Aurigids on the 11th<\/sup>,\nthe Epsilon Geminids on the 18th<\/sup>,\nand the Leonis Minorids on the 24th<\/sup>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n

This would be a\ngood month to get ready for November’s transit of Mercury. People in\nAfrica will see the beginning. Viewers in South America and from\nAtlantic Ocean locations will see all of it. The end is visible in\nNorth America. That will be on November 11.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

You must protect\nyour eyes from the sun’s brightness and invisible radiation.\nProjecting an image of the sun in a pinhole viewer isn’t likely to\ngive you something that’s both bright enough and big enough to see\nthe black dot that is our solar system’s first planet. You can use a\ntelescope or binoculars to project the image, but don’t do it for\nmore than a few seconds at a time if you don’t have a filter reducing\nthe amount of light going into the optics. If you get such a filter,\nmake sure it’s one that is made specifically for solar viewing. That\nway, it’ll be safe for you to look directly through the scope.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u00a1SkyCaramba!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A thin, crescent moon greets us in the western sky at dusk when October starts. See Antares and Jupiter in the southwest and Saturn in the south. Venus and Mercury are evening object, too. But they’re barely there, setting almost as soon as the sun does. The moon passes by Antares in the claws of […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[50],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-463","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-50"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.skycaramba.com\/monthly\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/463","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.skycaramba.com\/monthly\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.skycaramba.com\/monthly\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.skycaramba.com\/monthly\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.skycaramba.com\/monthly\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=463"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.skycaramba.com\/monthly\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/463\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":468,"href":"https:\/\/www.skycaramba.com\/monthly\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/463\/revisions\/468"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.skycaramba.com\/monthly\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=463"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.skycaramba.com\/monthly\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=463"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.skycaramba.com\/monthly\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=463"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}