Bright Star

Good Morning Ruth and Ian

May I well ask what are you doing up at 3.30am or I should not be so nosey?????

Ask and you shall be rewarded:

Jupiter
Dawn is the hour when Jupiter is highest in the southeast. It pokes over the horizon by 3 A.M. local daylight time June 1st and is 25° high by this time at month's end. The gas giant spends June in the constellation Pisces the Fish and shining at magnitude -2.4 it dominates this region of sky.
Jupiter makes a great target for your telescope. A small instrument at about 70x readily shows two dusky belts spanning Jupiter's equatorial region. The planet's disk measures 38" at the start of the month, but by late June, as Jupiter gets closer to us, the disk's angular size increases to 42". Notice its polar diameter spans 3" less, which gives Jupiter a distinct flattened appearance. This comes about because of its fast rotation - the planet's gravity cannot hold the bulging equatorial regions as tightly.
Moving in line with Jupiter's equator are the four bright Galilean moons: Io, Europa, Ganymede, and Callisto. They appear as bright stars on either side of Jupiter and move relative to every other hour to hour, and night to night.
Telescope owners enjoy watching the moons pass in front of Jupiter, cast their shadows on Jupiter (the shadows are dark and contrast well against the bright white clouds), disappear in eclipse in the planet's shadow, become occulted by the edge of the planet, or even (very rarely) eclipse each other.

Don't worry, I would always think the same years ago when doing the night shift at vintage and was always a great sight.

I hope that you have a Great Australia Day. Fiona and I are off over to the beach today.


All the very best.


Regards Stephen and Fiona.

Good morning Ruth
Your 'star' would be The Planet Venus. The brightest in the heavens.
My son in law who is a bricklayer has of all things has had a hobby of star gazing for about six years. He is so pedantic with his trade and this quality shows with his hobby. He has built an observatory in his yard with an enormous telescope in it.
It is not unusual to get an email from 'Be here by 3am, the conditions are good to have a look at the rings of Saturn and its moons'
Stan

Ruth, try this website....

http://www.skymapper.co.uk/html/your_sky_now.html

Select your location from the map of the world....
Select the hours between now & 3am
then select the EAST arrow to bring EAST to the middle...

Looks like it was VENUS to me!

Cheers

Go to this site and register (free) with your location.

You can then learn what can be seen in the sky at any time.

Have a look at Iridium Flares. Fascinating . Get the kids, or yourself to spot them, amazing.

You can also change your location at any-time, eg..going to Nullabor Roadhouse for the weekend...put that as your location and see what is happening there.

Set your clock by the servers clock, accurate to better than 1/10 second (depending on your download speed I guess).

Cheers Neil

Thanks everyone - can't stop to talk now have to get back to my new favourite sites!