Direction/Time: i. For night Owls: after 9pm if one looks towards East Direction one can see bright moon and a Non-twinkling star like object near it. This non twinkling reddish object is nothing but planet Mars.
ii. For Morning Walkers: Whereas morning walkers before Sun rise can look towards West Direction to spot Planet Mars.
Three More Planets in the Sky: Further apart from this conjunction event on 10th Feb one can also witness planet Jupiter, Venus and Saturn in the skies.
Planet Jupiter & Venus – after Sunset to 11 p.m. – West Direction : After Sunset if one can look towards West Direction one can see very bright Non-Twinkling star like object which is Planet Venus (visible up till 9 pm. ) and bit far above it one can see Planet Jupiter (up till 11 p.m.)
Planet Saturn: Further rising close to midnight these days Planet Saturn is visible in the East Direction from 11.30 p.m. onwards and can be spotted above Southwest in the morning hours.
Coming up next on 12/13 Feb Trianglar pairing of 3 Celestial bodies...comeback here to watch out
Explanation notes :
1. Moon: Moon is the only natural satellite of Earth. Moon as observed from earth appears at a new location in the night sky every subsequent night i.e. moon can be found at new place often near to a star/planet. This happens because of moon’s motion.
2. Conjunction: Conjunction is a term used in positional astronomy It means that, as seen from some place (usually the Earth), two celestial bodies appear near one another in the sky. Importantly a day before & after people can notice one of the objects getting close or getting away after the celestial meeting. Moon, Planets are located at greater distance from earth and they themselves are separated by enormous distance. However due to conjunction they appear near to each other.
Like every year in 2012 there would be more than 80 Conjunctions giving us opportunity to locate planets easily with help of moon and other celestial bodies.
3. About Spica – the 15th Brightest Star: Spica (α Vir, α Virginis, Alpha Virginis) also known as Chitra nakshatra is the brightest star in the constellation Virgo, and the 15th brightest star in the nighttime sky. It is located at 260 light years away from us. Spica is a close binary star whose components orbit about each other every four days.
