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What’s up in Space?
February 2017 Twins and Triangles
The chart is orientated for
January 1 at 1am
January 15 at midnight
February 1 at 11pm
February 15 at 10pm
In the west bright Venus is beginning its journey back
towards the Sun. Still visible in the dusk skies, it will be
setting as twilight ends at the beginning of the month,
around an hour and a half after the Sun, but just 30 minutes
after sunset by month’s end. Fainter red Mars is above,
holding its position well as it moves through the constellation
of Pisces, the fish.
brighter of the two main stars that form the constellation
of Canis Minor, Orion’s small hunting dog. Procyon is the
eighth brightest star in the night-time sky and, like Sirius
(at approximately 9 light years distant) is one of our Sun’s
nearest neighbours at just 11 light years away. Also like
Sirius, it is a binary star system with a 1.5 solar mass primary
star and a faint white dwarf companion.
On the opposite side of the sky, golden Jupiter is now rising
just before midnight at the start of the month and by around
10pm, as twilight ends, at the end.
Below Canis Minor sit another pair of stars, Castor and
Pollux, marking the heads of Gemini, the twins.
Orion, the hunter, is high in the north after dark, with Sirius, or
Takurua, the brightest star in our night-time sky, even higher.
Below and to the right, and forming the southern hemisphere
Summer Triangle with Sirius and Betelgeuse, is Procyon, the
Pollux, the higher and brighter of the two stars, is the 17th
brightest star in our night sky. It is about 35 light years away
from us, whilst Castor is a sextuple star system located
52 light years from Earth.