X-Highlight – Page 19 – Astronomy Now

See a total eclipse of the Moon

13 May 2022 Mark Armstrong

On the 15/16 May (Sunday into Monday) there’s a total eclipse of the Moon visible primarily in the Western Hemisphere, with UK observers catching just the start of totality as the Moon is very close to setting.

Milky Way’s supermassive black hole shines in stunning first portrait

12 May 2022 Keith Cooper

The black hole in the centre of our Milky Way Galaxy has been imaged for the first time, showing a ring of gas encircling the event horizon, beyond which no light can escape.

Observe the Moon occulting Porrima, Virgo’s celebrated second star.

11 May 2022 Mark Armstrong

On the morning of 13 May (12/13), the Moon occults Porrima (gamma Virginis), Virgo’s celebrated binary star, in an event that’s visible across the UK.

Ingenuity zooms over Mars rover’s discarded parachute and backshell

2 May 2022 Astronomy Now

The Ingenuity Mars helicopter captures intriguing images of the Perseverance rover’s discarded parachute and backshell.

Phobos transits the Sun, captured by Mars Rover

27 April 2022 Mark Armstrong

NASA’s Perseverance Mars rover’s Mastcam-Z camera has captured Phobos, the larger of Mars’ two small moons (27 x 22 x 18 kilometres), as it transited the Sun’s disc on 2 April

Don’t miss Mercury, now at its evening’s best for the year

24 April 2022 Mark Armstrong

Mercury is now visible soon after sunset in the west-north-western sky.

Link-up with the Lyrids

20 April 2022 Mark Armstrong

The return of the yearly April Lyrids meteor shower is very welcome for meteor observers, breaking the roughly 15-week hiatus since the maximum of the Quadrantids meteor shower on 3 January.

The largest comet ever seen has been measured – and it’s a whopper

14 April 2022 Keith Cooper

The nucleus of the largest known comet in the Solar System, C/2014 UN271 (Bernardinelli–Bernstein), has been measured by the Hubble Space Telescope to be 129 kilometres across.

Mars and Saturn come together in the pre-dawn sky

1 April 2022 Mark Armstrong

The next two months or so promises to be an exciting one if you enjoy viewing close conjunctions between the major planets – and who doesn’t!

Observe contrasting galaxies M108 and M109

9 March 2022 Mark Armstrong

Early spring sees the return of the galaxies, monumental rotating structures of many millions of gravitationally bound stars amid interstellar dust and gas that span tens of thousands or more light years in diameter.