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This is the Griffith Observatory Sky Report for the week ending Wednesday, August 13, 2014. Here is what’s happening in the skies of southern California:
The waxing gibbous moon becomes full on the 10th. At 10:59 a.m., PDT, only 20 minutes before the moon is full, it will be at perigee, the closest point of the moon’s elliptical orbit to earth, creating what is sometimes called a “supermoon.” Although the moon is not visible from Los Angeles at the moment it is full, our best views will be shortly before the moon sets at 6:07 a.m. on the 10th, and again when it rises, at 7:40 p.m. on the 10th. Moonrise and moonset are the best time to look for any visible effect because of the horizon illusion (which makes the moon look large just because it is bright and close to the horizon), combined with the fact that it is about 7 percent larger than average. This month’s perigee distance between the earth and moon is 221,765 miles, according to the JPL Horizons ephemeris interface. On following days, the moon is gibbous, and begins to rise after sunset. By the 12th, moonrise is at 9:04 p.m.
The moon’s brilliance in the morning sky shortly after full moon is bad news for this year’s Perseid meteor shower, due to reach its peak in the period before midnight on the 12th until dawn on the13th. Although moonlight will obscure fainter Perseids, a few bright meteors should be visible.
On the 9th, the orange planet Mars leaves Virgo the Maiden and joins golden planet Saturn in Libra the scales. The planets appear in the southwest as darkness falls, with the flanking stars Spica, of Virgo, and Antares, of Scorpius the Scorpion. Both planets set at about midnight.
The brightest planet, Venus, is visible low in the east-northeast during the dawn. On the 9th, at 5:40 a.m., look to the lower left of Venus to see the planet Jupiter as it begins several months of visibility in the morning sky.
The European Space Agency probe Rosetta is now in orbit around the nucleus of comet 67/P Churyumov-Gerasimenko. The orbiter is returning stunning images of the comet. These can be seen at ESA’s “Space In Images” Rosetta webpage.
Free views of the sun during the day and of the moon, planets, and other celestial objects at night are available to the public in clear weather through Griffith Observatory’s telescopes from Tuesday through Sunday before 9:30 p.m. Check our website for our schedule. The next public star party on the grounds of Griffith Observatory, hosted by the Los Angeles Astronomical Society, the Sidewalk Astronomers, and the Planetary Society, will take place on Saturday, August 30.
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From Griffith Observatory, I’m Anthony Cook and I can be reached at griffithobserver@gmail.com.