Venus, Saturn, Jupiter

[altivo]

For those with an interest in the sky, and lucky enough to have a clear nighttime view:

We were enchanted just after sunset last night by the brilliance of Venus. If it's clear, you can't miss it. Extremely bright and high above the horizon if you face southwest.

I was sure it was Venus even without consulting any references, because nothing else shines like that (at least here.) Now, just shortly after Venus becomes visible, Jupiter appears as well and is also very bright though Venus easily outshines it. Face south and look up a little higher and a bit to the left, there it is.

If you wait a little longer, until more background stars appear, then imagine a line between Venus and Jupiter. About one quarter or so of the distance away from Jupiter and along that line, you will see Saturn a bit above (Northwards) of the line. Saturn is sometimes much brighter than it is right now, especially when it is located opposite the sun, but at the present it seems like a rather undistinguished star unless you have a telescope or binoculars handy. With those you can see the rings that are Saturn's earmarks.

The telescopic aid usually reveals at least a couple of Jupiter's moons as well, bright points close in to the planet itself, but I didn't check last night to see what was visible that way.

In any case, I can't recommend Venus highly enough. It's brilliant and a beautiful blue white color right now. Take a few minutes to look at it.

Comments

[ranunculus]

We have been enjoying Venus, and Jupiter as well for a while now. Really spectacular on these "dark-of-the-moon" nights! One evening recently Venus was so bright that it competed well with the brilliant red sunset.

[altivo]

Indeed, I have seen Venus actually cast shadows onto snowy ground on a cold, clear winter night. The angle of the shadows made it clear that Venus was the source of the light.

[ranunculus]

Wow! No snow here so harder to see shadows! But it sure is bright these evenings.

[frith]

Yes, Venus has been ridiculously bright lately. I'd been meaning to look up a Night Sky blurb, so thanks for the head's up. ^_^ (tongue is firmly in cheek.)

I heard that there's to be a solar eclipse this weekend.

[altivo]

I believe that eclipse is to be visible only from the southern hemisphere, alas. But as usual, a solar eclipse is paired with a lunar eclipse either two weeks before or two weeks after it. We had the lunar eclipse, which was quite impressive and visible here.

[frith]

Yes, I got up around 4 AM and saw it too. ^_^

[hrrunka]

Saturday's solar eclipse features in yesterday's APOD ( https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap211205.html ) as a photo taken from a plane flying through the eclipse path.

[hrrunka]

Local geography hides the western skies from us here, but Jupiter was a fine sight earlier. I've spent the evening listening to a filk concert stream, with, inevitably, at least a few songs about stars. Dave Clement just sang an old favourite of mine, Sam Baardman's "Solar Flare".

[altivo]

I'm sure you've seen Venus before. But the show is so spectacular right now it's worth going somewhere to get the view--especially if you can photograph it I would think.

I don't know Baardman or "Solar Flare." Guess I'd better look that up.

[hrrunka]

Yes. It's one of the flaws of our present home, that the sunset is hidden from us unless we take a walk uphill. This time of year we get very little direct sunshine. The views out towards the Severn, Gloucester, and the Malverns in the distance are some compensation.

Sam and Dave are Canadian folk singers who turn up at filk conventions from time to time. "Solar Flare" struck a chord last night (or rather, really early this morning) because the chorus goes:

And there's a comet just outside my window
Hanging in the afterglow of a solar flare
And a star like a diamond spilling off of the moon
I can feel there's a change, and it's coming on soon

First time I heard the song, Sam was singing it, and said that a view of comet Hale Bopp was its inspiration. There was also a conjunction of a thin crescent Moon and Venus at the time. Throw in a pretty aurora, and I can understand the experience being memorable.

[altivo]

Found it on YouTube. Those lyrics are gonna be a challenge I think.

Oh yes, I remember Hale Bopp. Definitely the best and brightest comet I have seen. Even in the murk and light pollution of Chicago it was amazing.

Is there a recording of Dave Clement? The one on YouTube is Baardman himself I believe.

[hrrunka]

The YouTube I found is straight off the same CD as I have, by Sam. Dave is somewhat harder to find on the Net, partly because there are quite a few other Dave Clements out there. Decadent Dave throws up a few filk con hits, but no recordings. The Dandelion Wine website hasn't been updated in quite a while, and has too many broken links to be useful. They did record Solar Flare for their CD "The Face On Mars" over a decade ago, but the only sales link is to CDBaby, who appear to have stopped selling CDs back in 2020. The Dandelion Wine on Bandcamp is something completely different. However, it seems FilkCast has played Dandelion Wine's version of Solar Flare in Episode 78 back in January. The song starts at 43:47. ( http://filkcast.blogspot.com/2021/01/filkcast-episode-78-january-20-2021.html )

[altivo]

Wow, thanks for doing all that searching for me. I'll check the Filkcast link, but Sam's own version is clear enough and has the lyrics printed out. I need to feed one through Chordify to get the progression the lazy way and I can work from there.