{"id":2909,"date":"2022-04-01T08:38:38","date_gmt":"2022-04-01T08:38:38","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.griffithmedia.org\/skyreport\/?p=2909"},"modified":"2022-04-01T08:38:38","modified_gmt":"2022-04-01T08:38:38","slug":"griffith-observatory-sky-report-through-april-2022","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.griffithmedia.org\/skyreport\/2022\/04\/01\/griffith-observatory-sky-report-through-april-2022\/","title":{"rendered":"Griffith Observatory Sky Report through April, 2022"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Click<\/strong><\/a>LISTEN to this week\u2019s Sky Report<\/p>\nhttps:\/\/www.griffithmedia.org\/skyreport\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/04\/Apr2022_SR.mp3<\/a><\/audio>\n

This is the Griffith Observatory Sky Report for the period between April 1 and April 30, 2022. Here are the events happening in the sky of southern California.<\/p>\n

Mercury<\/strong> is close to the sun on the 1st<\/sup> and can\u2019t be seen. The planet moves into the evening sky, and on the 30th<\/sup>, the sun sets at 7:37 p.m., PDT, and Mercury sets at 9:19 p.m., PDT, one hour and 42 minutes later. Do not observe any planet when it appears close to the sun, for the danger to the eyes is great.<\/p>\n

Venus<\/strong> rises at 4:32 a.m., PDT, and the sun rises at 6:40 a.m., PDT, on the 1st<\/sup>. The planet is at a half-phase, 56-percent illuminated and 22 arcseconds in width. On the 30th<\/sup>, Venus rises at 4:14 a.m., PDT, and the sun rises at 6:05 a.m., PDT. The planet is then 68-percent illuminated and 17 arcseconds in width.\u00a0 The disk of Venus slowly reduces in size and becomes more fully illuminated as it moves to the far side of its orbit.<\/p>\n

Mars<\/strong> rises at 4:25 a.m., PDT, on the 1st<\/sup>, and on the 30th<\/sup>, it rises at 3:33 a.m., PDT. The disk of Mars is only 5.7 arcseconds wide and will not show any surface features through a telescope.<\/p>\n

Jupiter<\/strong> rises at 5:51 a.m., PDT, on the 1st<\/sup>, and rises at 4:14 a.m., PDT, on the 30th<\/sup>. On the 12th<\/sup>, Neptune is six arcminutes south of Jupiter as both rise at 5:15 a.m., PDT. Because the sun rises at 6:26 a.m., PDT, this will be a tough event to see. A telescope capable of magnification 50x will show the Red Spot, and the four bright Galilean moons may be seen moving back and forth, roughly in a line centered on Jupiter.<\/p>\n

Saturn<\/strong> rises at 4:31 a.m., PDT, on the 1st<\/sup> and at 2:43 a.m., PDT, on the 30th<\/sup>. The rings and Saturn\u2019s largest moon Titan may be seen with a telescope capable of magnification 50x.<\/p>\n

Uranus<\/strong> sets at 9:38 p.m., PDT, on the 1st<\/sup>, and the sun sets at 7:14 p.m., PDT. On the 30th<\/sup>, the sun sets at 7:37 p.m., PDT, and Uranus sets at 7:52 p.m., PDT. The planet is then unobservable. On the 15th<\/sup>, Uranus is at Right Ascension 2h<\/sup> 44m<\/sup> 11s<\/sup> with a Declination of +15\u00b0 30\u02b9 28\u02ba. Uranus is only 3.4 arcseconds wide, and so a telescope with a magnification of 150x is needed to show its diminutive disk.<\/p>\n

Neptune<\/strong> rises at 5:57 a.m., PDT, on the 1st<\/sup> and at 4:06 a.m., PDT, on the 30th<\/sup>. On the 15th<\/sup>, Neptune is at Right Ascension 23h<\/sup> 38m<\/sup> 58s<\/sup> with a Declination of -3\u00b0 30\u02b9 15\u02ba.<\/p>\n

First quarter occurs on the 8th<\/sup>, full moon on the 16th<\/sup>, last quarter on the 23rd<\/sup>, and new moon on the 30th<\/sup>.<\/p>\n

SPECIAL EVENTS<\/strong><\/p>\n

The Lyrid meteor shower<\/strong> peaks from the evening of April 21 to the morning of April 22. The parent body is the comet C\/1861 G1 (Thatcher). The Lyrids are named after the constellation of Lyra the Harp, from which they appear to originate. The Lyrids are a medium-strength shower, with perhaps 18 meteors per hour at the peak, with occasional fireballs. The 61-percent waning gibbous Moon will interfere with observations.<\/p>\n

Follow\u00a0All Space Considered<\/a> and\u00a0Griffith Observatory<\/a> on Twitter for updates on astronomy and space-related events.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

LISTEN to this week\u2019s Sky Report https:\/\/www.griffithmedia.org\/skyreport\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/04\/Apr2022_SR.mp3 This is the Griffith Observatory Sky Report for the period between April 1 and April 30, 2022. Here are the events happening in the sky of southern California. Mercury is close to the … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2909","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-skyreport"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.griffithmedia.org\/skyreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2909","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.griffithmedia.org\/skyreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.griffithmedia.org\/skyreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.griffithmedia.org\/skyreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/7"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.griffithmedia.org\/skyreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2909"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.griffithmedia.org\/skyreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2909\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2911,"href":"https:\/\/www.griffithmedia.org\/skyreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2909\/revisions\/2911"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.griffithmedia.org\/skyreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2909"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.griffithmedia.org\/skyreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2909"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.griffithmedia.org\/skyreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2909"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}