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<< Previous   of   Next >> (click to enlarge) (click to enlarge)   ADVERTISEMENT   CONTACT THE HERALD Melanie Munk, Features Editor munk@heraldnet.com   Published: Saturday, May 10, 2008 Mars just one part of evening celestial shows By Mike Lynch Special to The Herald Mercury, the closest planet to the sun, is a shy planet. Most of the time, it hides from our view because it is so close to the sun, orbiting around our home star every 88 days at an average distance of only 36 million miles. Earth circles the sun at a distance of 93 million miles. Because Mercury has such a tight orbit, it never gets too far away from the sun. When it is visible in our sky, you can see it in either the early morning or early evening twilight. For the next week or so, Mercury can be seen easily with the naked eye in the west-northwestern sky. Don't wait too late in the evening to start looking for it, however, or you'll miss it. This week, Mercury is in what astronomers call its "greatest eastern elongation" from the sun. In plain English, that means Mercury is at its farthest angular distance east of the sun in our sky. Mercury will be 22 degrees east of the sun, so when the sun sets this week, Mercury will trail 22 degrees behind it. That's not very far away from the sun; meaning that Mercury will set only about an hour after sunset, so start looking for Mercury as soon as you can toward the end of evening twilight. After this week, Mercury will start becoming more elusive, as it moves westward among the stars, setting closer and closer to sunset, eventually getting lost in the early twilight glare. So, to find Mercury, look in the low west-northwest sky toward the end of twilight for two moderately bright stars, one on the left and one on the right, separated by about 25 degrees, or the equivalent of 2 1/2 widths of your fist held at arm's length. The one on the left is Betelgeuse, the second brightest star in the constellation Orion, which is now mostly below the horizon. The "star" on the right is actually Mercury, sporting a reddish hue, mainly because it's closing in on the horizon. Just like the sun and moon, the stars and planets turn reddish as they set because of Earth's atmosphere. The light from any celestial object close to the horizon must pierce more of the surrounding shell of Earth's atmosphere, which scatters all but the red and orange components of the light. Don't get too excited about checking out Mercury through your telescope, because there really isn't much to see. Since the planet is so low in the sky, it will be fuzzy. Even if we had a clear view, you still wouldn't see much, as it's more than 82 million miles away and only a little more than 3,000 miles in diameter -- not much larger than our moon. Speaking of which, Mercury's heavily cratered surface causes it to resemble our moon. The Messenger spacecraft launched in 2004 got a great look at Mercury when it passed within 150 miles of the planet's surface in January, and will pass by it twice more before settling into orbit around the sun-baked planet in 2011. Mercury's surface temperature reaches more than 800 degrees -- hot enough to melt lead. Two other planets, Saturn and Mars, also are available in the evening sky this week, and they're much higher in the western sky than Mercury. Saturn is the brighter of two, shining high in the southwestern sky in the constellation Leo, which, as I always remind you, resembles a backward question mark. The diagram shows the waxing gibbous moon passing close by Saturn on Sunday and Monday nights. Saturn, with its wonderful ring system and family of moons, is definitely worth a look through your telescope. The planet is just under 850 million miles away from Earth this week. Mars is shining with a reddish glow a little lower in the western sky, about three fist widths to the lower right of Saturn. Later this month, the red planet will cross in front of a big, bright star cluster called the Beehive cluster, which is definitely something at which you'll want to aim your telescope or binoculars. I'll have more on the Mars invasion of the great Beehive next week. Mike Lynch is an amateur astronomer and professional broadcast meteorologist for WCCO Radio in Minneapolis and author of the book, "Washington Starwatch," available at bookstores and at his Web site www.lynchandthestars.com. The Everett Astronomical Society welcomes new members and puts on public star parties. The Web site is members.tripod.com/everett_astronomy.

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