{"id":587,"date":"2020-11-29T00:00:54","date_gmt":"2020-11-29T00:00:54","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.skycaramba.com\/monthly\/?p=587"},"modified":"2020-11-08T04:00:53","modified_gmt":"2020-11-08T04:00:53","slug":"december-2020","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.skycaramba.com\/monthly\/december-2020\/","title":{"rendered":"December 2020"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

The\nmonth starts with the moon just past full. While it’s rising, above\nit is Mars and nearly opposite the moon in the sky are Jupiter and\nSaturn.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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

Jupiter\nand Saturn own our evening sky show this month. Saturn is east of\nJupiter at the start of the month. Both are moving east, but Jupiter\nis moving faster and catching up to Saturn. The thin, crescent moon\npasses the planets on the 16th<\/sup>.\nOn the 21st<\/sup>,\nthey’ll be 0.1\u00b0 apart\u2014their closest call since 1623. Then Jupiter\npasses Saturn and keeps heading on into Capricornus. You don’t have\nlong after sunset to see them. They set by mid-evening. These two\nplanets will stay close together into the new year and maybe there’ll\nbe more excitement when Mercury joins them in January.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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

Mars\nis high in the west at sunset. It’s moving from the western fish in\nPisces to the eastern one. The moon, just past first quarter, will be\nin the neighborhood on the 23rd.<\/sup><\/p>\n\n\n\n

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

Venus\ncontinues shining bright in the morning. It’s on one side of Libra.\nMercury is on the other. Mercury is already hard to see for northern\nsky watchers. As Venus crosses west to east through the diamond of\nLibra this month, Mercury disappears into the sunrise. The moon is\nclose to Venus on the 12th<\/sup>.\nBy that time, Venus has emerged on the east of Libra. Getting into\nScorpius, Venus is close to Antares on the 25th<\/sup>\nand 26th<\/sup>.\nThe planet stays close to the horizon before sunrise the rest of the\nmonth and into the new year.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Mercury\nis at aphelion on the 16th<\/sup>,\n0.467 astronomical units from the sun. It’s at superior conjunction\non the 20th<\/sup>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The\nGeminids are the major meteor shower this month and are often the\nbest of the year. They could peak on the 14th<\/sup>\nat 0 hours. The moon will be new, so moonlight won’t interfere with\nseeing up to 150 brightly colored meteors per hour pretty much all\nnight long, especially after midnight when Gemini is highest. The\nmeteors from this shower are linked to an asteroid named Phaethon\n3200. It likely is the rock left over after a comet shed all its icy\nmaterial.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Another\nmeteor shower to consider is the Ursids. Its possible peak is on the\n22nd<\/sup>\nat 8 hours UT. Because the meteors radiate from Ursa Major, the far\nnorthern constellation that gives us the big dipper going ’round the\nnorth celestial pole, this is primarily a northern hemisphere shower.\nThe first quarter moon may interfere until around midnight. After\nthat, it’s easier to see up to ten meteors per hour. Parent comet\n8P\/Tuttle will be at perihelion next August. So maybe next year’s\nUrsids will be better.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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

The\nsouthern hemisphere gets a total solar eclipse on the 14th<\/sup>.\nThe path of totality starts in the Pacific Ocean and ends in the\nAtlantic close to Africa. On the way, it crosses Chile and Argentina.\nThe central part of the moon’s shadow will cross South America from\nabout 16:00 to 16:20 Universal Time. Partial phases of this eclipse\nwill last up to about two-and-three-quarter hours. The total phase,\nwill be up to two minutes, ten seconds. Remember to never look\ndirectly at the sun during the partial phase of a solar eclipse. You\nmust protect your eyes with a filter made for viewing the sun. You\ncan view it safely naked eye only during the total phase.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The\nmoon’s circumstances this month: northern lunistice on the 3rd<\/sup>\nat 24.9\u00b0, going south of the equator on the 9th<\/sup>,\nsouthern lunistice on the 15th<\/sup>\nat 24.9\u00b0, going north of the equator on the 22nd<\/sup>,\nand northern lunistice again on the 30th<\/sup>\nat 24.9\u00b0. Perigee is on the 12th<\/sup>\nat 361,700 km or 224,800 miles. Apogee is on the 24th<\/sup>\nat 405,100 km or 251,700 miles. The moon is at last quarter on the\n8th<\/sup>,\nit’s new on the 14th<\/sup>,\nfirst quarter is on the 21st<\/sup>,\nand it’s full on the 30th<\/sup>.\nThat full moon, happening at northern lunistice, means it’ll be high\nand bright for northern hemisphere sky watchers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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

Careful\nobservers may be able to see Venus disappear behind the moon when the\ntwo are close on the 12th<\/sup>.\nThis will be a daytime occultation for most observers. In far\nnortheast Russia from the Kamchatka peninsula to the Anadyr Plateau,\nit’ll happen just before sunrise. From Alaska, western Canada, and\nthe western lower 48 U.S. states, it’ll be afternoon. You’ll need\nbinoculars and you’ll have to know exactly where to look to see Venus\nvanish and then come back as the moon passes in front.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Earth’s\nsolstice is on the 21st<\/sup>\nat 10:03 UT. The southern hemisphere is most tilted toward the sun at\nthis time. We call it the winter solstice in the northern hemisphere\nbecause it’s winter when it happens. Likewise, it’s the summer\nsolstice in the southern hemisphere.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Notable\nconjunctions with the moon this month:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

4th<\/sup>\n\u2013 Pollux 3.7\u00b0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

6th<\/sup>\n\u2013 Regulus 4.5\u00b0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

10th<\/sup>\n\u2013 Spica 6.4\u00b0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

12th<\/sup>\n\u2013 Venus 0.8\u00b0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

13th<\/sup>\n\u2013 Antares 5.5\u00b0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

14th<\/sup>\n\u2013 Mercury 0.1\u00b0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

17th<\/sup>\n\u2013 Jupiter 2.9\u00b0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

17th<\/sup>\n\u2013 Saturn 3.0\u00b0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

20th<\/sup>\n\u2013 Neptune 4.2\u00b0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

23rd<\/sup>\n\u2013 Mars 5.1\u00b0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

25th<\/sup>\n\u2013 Uranus 3.2\u00b0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

27th<\/sup>\n\u2013 Aldebaran 4.5\u00b0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

31st<\/sup>\n\u2013 Pollux 3.8\u00b0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Other\nnotable conjunctions:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

8th<\/sup>\n\u2013 Mercury and Antares 4.3\u00b0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

21st<\/sup>\n\u2013 Saturn and Jupiter 0.1\u00b0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

23rd<\/sup>\n\u2013 Venus and Antares 5.5\u00b0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The month starts with the moon just past full. While it’s rising, above it is Mars and nearly opposite the moon in the sky are Jupiter and Saturn. Jupiter and Saturn own our evening sky show this month. Saturn is east of Jupiter at the start of the month. Both are moving east, but Jupiter […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[59],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-587","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-59"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.skycaramba.com\/monthly\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/587","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=587"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/www.skycaramba.com\/monthly\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/587\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":597,"href":"https:\/\/www.skycaramba.com\/monthly\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/587\/revisions\/597"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.skycaramba.com\/monthly\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=587"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.skycaramba.com\/monthly\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=587"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.skycaramba.com\/monthly\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=587"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}