Starwatch

Published 9:00 pm Friday, April 21, 2006

It’s that time of year when you can comfortably lie back on the ground and gaze upon the stars. I highly recommend it now, even though the stars and constellations of spring aren’t nearly as vivid as the bright winter shiners. Adding to the challenge of spring stargazing is increased daylight and daylight savings time. You won’t be able to get going on your stargazing until later in the evening.

It’s still a great experience to lie back under the stars, especially on a hilltop or somewhere in the middle a really flat plain. Of course, if you can get away from at least some of the heavy city lighting, that will make the celestial show even more fabulous.

As you relax, you can imagine yourself on a spaceship traveling through heavens. Well, as a matter of fact, you are. Everybody and everything on this planet are aboard spaceship Earth, hurtling through space.

First off, spaceship Earth is always shifting around internally. In fact, all the continents of the Earth are drifting, some up to eight inches a year. North America is drifting westward from Europe at the pace of 2 to 3 inches a year. And of course we have occasional earthquakes and volcanoes.

That’s nothing though, compared to the movement the entire spaceship Earth experiences. Even though you can’t feel it, the Earth is spinning on its axis at more than 1,000 miles an hour. You’d think we’d get dizzy. Evidence of Earth’s rotation is seen as the stars move together toward west and also spin around Polaris, a star shining above the Earth’s North Pole. And as long as I bring up the North Pole, keep in mind that Earth’s axis between the north and south is also wobbling in a 26,000-year cycle.

We’ve only begun though. Along with our 1,000-mph-plus rotation speed, we’re cranking along in orbit around the sun at more than 64,000 mph, or about 19 miles a second. But you also have to realize that the entire solar system and our sun are all zipping along in a huge orbit around the center of our own spiral-shaped Milky Way at more than 600,000 mph.

If that’s not enough motion for you, astronomers now believe that our entire Milky Way galaxy is cruising though this part of the universe at more than 1.3 million mph! Have you ever thought to yourself, “I’m going nowhere”? Well nothing could be farther from the truth.

Mike Lynch is an amateur astronomer and professional broadcast meteorologist for WCCO Radio in Minneapolis and author of the new book “Washington Starwatch,” available at bookstores and on his Web site, www.lynchandthestars.com.