You won't have to get out your telescopes to see Mars, Venus and the moon put on a show, Jan. 31.
The three celestial objects will be exceptionally close to each other on Tuesday night in a rare celestial treat called a conjunction.
[...] Kief says the best time to watch the conjunction is after sunset, starting at 8 p.m. PT. [Editor's Note: UTC-8]
He says to identify Venus, look for the glowing object that has a red and yellow tinge to it. Venus will shine slightly brighter than Mars, since it's closer to the Earth. Mars has an orange and red tinge to it.
And remember, if the celestial object you're looking at twinkles, it's probably not a planet.
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Mars, Venus, Moon Conjuction on Tuesday
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(Score: 2) by gawdonblue on Tuesday January 31 2017, @10:53AM
:(
(Score: 2) by Unixnut on Tuesday January 31 2017, @11:43AM
Aaah, you must live in the UK. The one place where you are pretty much guaranteed to have a cloudy day if some interesting astronomical event is happening.
If Chile is an astronomers heaven, the UK is like an astronomers hell.
(Score: 3, Touché) by takyon on Tuesday January 31 2017, @12:35PM
It was good enough for Stonehenge.
[SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 2) by Unixnut on Tuesday January 31 2017, @01:41PM
Well, that is climate change for you. Maybe the weather was clearer back then :-)
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Tuesday January 31 2017, @03:24PM
I read something about that once. I think England had about fifteen to twenty clear days EVERY YEAR back then. It was amazing.
“Take me to the Brig. I want to see the “real Marines”. – Major General Chesty Puller, USMC
(Score: 2) by VLM on Tuesday January 31 2017, @01:20PM
the UK is like an astronomers hell.
Look on the bright side, vast areas of the USA are either in the deep negative degrees C in the winter while in the summer the clouds of mosquitoes block the view of the stars.
(Score: 2) by isostatic on Tuesday January 31 2017, @02:59PM
Yup, it's a right pain.
http://www.meteoradar.co.uk/clouds-sun-UK-Ireland [meteoradar.co.uk]
(Score: 2) by canopic jug on Tuesday January 31 2017, @02:23PM
Money is not free speech. Elections should not be auctions.
(Score: 2, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday January 31 2017, @02:00PM
Why teach people such stupid stuff. Venus
1) Is about half the distance to the Sun so gets hit with ~4x more light per unit area
2) Has an albedo ~3x that of Mars, so reflects that much higher a percentage of the light
3) Has ~4x the surface area of mars so reflects that much more light
So it will be ~48x brighter, having nothing to do with the current distance from Earth.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday January 31 2017, @02:54PM
Well, what about the inverse square law? Surely, being closer to the Earth does indeed help its brightness, too.
(Score: 4, Informative) by isostatic on Tuesday January 31 2017, @02:57PM
I haven't looked as to the relative positions of Mars and Venus, but for the last couple of months I've been looking at Venus/Mars/Moon whenever there's no clouds (sadly quite rare). You can just about pick out mars in my town (findable thanks to the position of venus/moon), but Venus is easily spottable.
However I'm not sure you can multiply those points. When Earth is directly between Mars and the Sun, 100% of the surface facing Earth is lit, and it's about as close as it gets. We never see 100% of Venus lit, as it would be behind the sun. When it's mostly lit but just visible above the Sun's corona, it's on the opposite side of the sun, so distance is Earth-Sun-Venus.
Venus-Sun: 110mkm
Earth-Sun: 150mkm
Mars-Sun: 205mkm
Earth-Venus at maximum reflectivity: 260mkm
Earth-Mars at maximum reflectivity: 55mkm
As it happens, venus is at its brightest when it's a crescent. When it's surface is 100% reflective, it's actually really dim! When it's closest, likewise it's really dim (invisible even)!
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday January 31 2017, @04:02PM
Yes, the phase will be yet another huge factor besides distance from the Earth. I also don't feel like working it all out right now though.
(Score: 2) by bob_super on Tuesday January 31 2017, @06:12PM
Someone did the math and wrote in a newspaper that Venus would keep getting brighter until about the 15th of February.
Then, as it gets closer to Earth, the crescent will shrink fast and reduce the reflected light.
Even if it's cloudy today for the conjunction, it's still not too late to notice how bright Venus is (the dim moon crescent is growing though).
(Score: 2, Disagree) by DeathMonkey on Tuesday January 31 2017, @06:36PM
I love that the AC decrees "Fake News" based on a ridiculous back of the envelope calculation. Meanwhile, iso just goes outside and looks. +1 for empiricism.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday January 31 2017, @07:54PM
If you read more carefully, you will see isostatic added a fourth factor of "phase" that can dominate the apparent relative brightness of Venus/Mars. He is not supporting the misleading claims of CBC that Venus is brighter because it is "closer to the Earth".
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday January 31 2017, @02:34PM
Venus is the brightest thing shining in the sky. It looks like somebody turned on a spotlight far-far away from you and is pointing it right at you. As I was observing it Friday night I had to use darkening filters (neutral density and variable polarizer) on my telescope to view it comfortably. And through a telescope it is a beautiful crescent right now - a bigger crescent by volume than the Moon right now.
Due to phase, it is brighter as a point source than the Moon is right now.
Look where the Moon is. You'll see Venus. Mars will be harder but should be visible and look for the orangeness. (You have to look in the Moon's vicinity because last I compared them it was easy to mistake Betelgeuse in the shoulder of Orion for Mars.)
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday January 31 2017, @05:34PM
Uranus will be nearby, too, but you'll have to imagine it.
(Score: 2) by rts008 on Tuesday January 31 2017, @09:09PM
Not if you have a mirror handy.
Have a mirror? Then you too, can goatse yourself!
* OMG! Look at the size of those bloody piles! Mount Doom, I tell you.*
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday January 31 2017, @09:05PM
> Venus is the brightest thing shining in the sky.
Apart from the sun, you insensitive clod.
(Score: 2) by mrpg on Tuesday January 31 2017, @11:24PM
I see it, looks nice :-)
(Score: 1) by aim on Wednesday February 01 2017, @09:04PM
Thank you for this article. It forewarned me just in time about the conjunction.
As I had plans for the evening, I just took along my tripod and camera, and around 18:30 GMT+1 went out to check on the weather - luckily, no clouds in the way. I could picture our three cosmic neighbors nicely, with (depending on the chosen lens, parts of) a big satellite antenna in the foreground. Here, the three were at distances so that with the telezoom at 100mm (on APS-C) I had them all nicely covered, with the 18-55mm I could choose to have the entire sat antenna in the frame. Had I waited longer, I'd have missed the event, as clouds did come up a bit later.
Tip for other such events: take whatever filter off your lens, it will otherwise create reflections for the bright objects (here: crescent of the moon, Venus). Do use a tripod. Preferrably, use mirror lock. Also, go low-ISO for less noise. And be careful about focusing, never trust autofocus. Find something interesting in the foreground for context, some sort of landmark.