Thursday, September 23, 2010

Seen With the Naked Eye, Tonight!

I have been watching the approach of a very bright object in the sky for a number of days now and of course, it is Jupiter...closest it's been to the earth in 47 years. However, whats been bugging me to death is that there has been this faint blur of an object with it. (Note: this is with the Mark 1 eyeball - I don't have access to a telescope.) One of Jupiter's moons maybe? Or maybe I need my eyes checked? Found out I am not losing either my mind, or my eyesight, or imagining things! There really is a secondary object there - its Uranus, also a gas giant, and now visible (and please can the inevitable jokes - I am really excited about the astronomy here!!) at it's closest conjunction with Jupiter! I really am seeing it! Ok, I'm a nerd, but this is great!
Happy sky gazing everyone!

Oh, and the picture of Jupiter here is taken from the Hubble and the visible object with it here is one of the famous four moons - Ganymede!

And this is a shot of Uranus with the extreme side ways axial tilt it has - it also has rings like Saturn, but they are not visible here.

2 comments:

  1. Jupiter and Ganymede! Same-sex love immortalized in the Heavens!

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  2. Shiny.
    Can't see it here in downtown too many lights.

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