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Greeting the dawn with a double morning star
All five visible planets are in our skies (visible without optics).
We are on the eve of two notable planetary conjunctions happening back-to-back.
April 29 (Friday – tonight) – Mercury’s conjunction with the Pleiades open star cluster (aka The Seven Sisters) and April 30 (Saturday – tomorrow) – the Venus-Jupiter sunrise conjunction.
I recommend that those wishing to view these astronomical phenomena from under our city’s diminished sky do so at least through a standard quality binocular (eg 7×50 mm); but out under a natural night sky (ie devoid of artificial-light pollution), these heavenly denizens will be revealed via good eyesight alone.
Mercury and Pleiades (chart above). All times in Mountain Daylight Time.
21:40-22:30 – The planet and the star cluster will be setting over the west-northwest horizon.
Altitudes for times cited: 11 and four degrees above horizon.
Venus and Jupiter (chart below). Essentially, the observational window is 30 minutes, commencing at 05:30.
05:00 Nautical twilight begins (astronomical twilight ends).
05:36 Venus and Jupiter ascend to four degrees above our eastern horizon.
Magnitudes: Venus –4.1 (brightest), and Jupiter –2.1.
05:46 Civil twilight begins (nautical twilight ends). 06:22 Sunrise (civil twilight ends).
Mars and Saturn will have already risen and will be higher and to the right; situated southward along the ecliptic at 16-degree intervals.
Sources:
Star charts – Skynews.ca. Times – Timesanddate.com.
Skyandtelescope.ca: “This Week’s Sky at a Glance, April 29-May 6,” and the site’s Interactive Sky Chart (set for Cranbrook’s geographical coordinates – Latitude 49° 31′ N & Longitude 115° 45′ W).
Submitted by Dan Hicks
