The space age is 50 years old
By Phyllis Burton Pitluga

Mars through a medium telescope, Photo by Kyle Edwards

Many of Atención’s readers will recall the first news on October 4, 1957, of an artificial satellite (the Soviet Union’s Sputnik) orbiting Earth. When I saw Sputnik gliding across the evening sky that October, my thought was that it would change everything. The space age had begun and the changes have been incredible.

Today satellites show us the dynamic weather of planet Earth. Communications satellites keep us in contact with all parts of the globe. We have learned how active our universe is from satellites pointed outward that are sensitive to light that doesn’t penetrate our atmosphere well— infrared, ultraviolet and gamma rays. Before the space age, the universe looked peacefully unchanging. Not anymore.

The robot space vehicles that have visited other planets and moons of our solar system revealed surprising worlds. Before the space age we thought that Venus was a tropical world beneath its thick clouds. Now we know that it is a parched world with a thick atmosphere of carbon dioxide that has caused a runaway greenhouse effect (enhancing concern for Earth and the prodigious amounts of carbon we are releasing into our own atmosphere).

Before the space age, Mars was viewed as having canals and life. Since the earliest planetary missions to Mars in the 1960’s, we have found a world that shows evidence of past flooding, current oozing but a planet that now is in its own ice age. Yet, we still hold onto the hope that life did get an early foothold and is thriving beneath the harsh radiation pummeling its surface. However, it seems only Earth is not too hot, not too cold, but just right for life to flourish upon its surface.

This winter, Mars will be shining brightly high in our sky. You can easily follow its motion in front of the more distant stars. As November begins, Mars is to the left (or east of) one of the bright stars in Gemini the Twins, the star Mebsuta. Look to the northeast about 10pm for the orange-red orb low to the horizon (the red star Betelgeuse in Orion is a little higher up, so don’t confuse them) and look for Mebsuta to the right. Over the next two weeks, Mars will drift away from Mebsuta as it orbits the sun. However, by mid-November, Mars will slow, stop, and begin to “back up” to approach Mebsuta as we Earth passes Mars (making it only appear to go in reverse). During November, Mars doubles in brightness and, in a telescope, grows 25 percent larger. Its shape will grow from gibbous (flattened oval) to nearly full. On December 24, Mars will be at opposition —opposite the Sun with the Earth exactly between them. This will be when Mars is biggest, brightest and fullest and rises as the sun sets. Follow these 
changes with your eyes, binoculars or a telescope to enjoy the cosmic choreography of our planetary system.


Leonid meteor shower, November 18

Every year there are more than a dozen meteor showers, approximately half of which are blotted out by bright moonlight. This year, with a first quarter moon setting before the shower radiant rises, the Leonids hold the promise to be exceptional from dark sky sites. Let your eyes adapt to the darkness of night and you will see even-fainter stars and meteors. Look to the east at midnight and overhead by dawn. Because meteors streak across a wide expanse of the sky, you do not need binoculars or telescopes; just observe with your eyes.

The meteor shower particles are grains of sand from comets that have orbited the sun son many times that their cohesive ices have evaporated, leaving a trail of rocky grains. The Leonid shower is what remains of Comet Temple-Tuttle (named after the comet discoverers of 1865–66). Every mid-November the Earth orbits through this debris field. The comet grains heat up from friction with Earth’s upper atmosphere, creating the glowing trails across our sky. These grains burn up and do not reach the surface of the Earth. Settle back in a chaise and let the “shooting stars” be your entertainment after the mariachis in the Jardín.

Phyllis Burton Pitluga is Astronomer Emerita at Adler Planetarium & Astronomy Museum. She is now a resident of San Miguel.


Sky Calendar, November 2007

By following the Moon as the biggest and brightest “pointer” in the sky during the month you can identify different planets and bright stars. On following nights you can relocate them but without the Moon—the Moon moves about 25 times its own diameter from one night to the next. The Moon is much closer than the planets of our solar system and the stars are even farther. So, when the Moon appears close to a celestial light, they are truly separated by millions, billions or trillions of miles.

Thursday, November 1: The last quarter moon rises after midnight 

Saturday, November 3: The waning crescent moon passes closely below the star, Regulus, the brightest star of the constellation of Leo the Lion, and a little further below Saturn in the dawn sky

Monday, November 5: The waning crescent moon passes below Venus

Wednesday, November 7: The waning crescent moon passes below the star Spica of the constellation of Virgo in the dawn sky

Thursday, November 8: The waning crescent moon passes below Mercury on the same morning that Mercury is highest in the dawn sky

Friday, November 9: New Moon (no Moon because the dark side faces Earth) 

Sunday, November 11: The waxing crescent moon passes below the bright star Antares in the constellation of Scorpious in the evening sky

Monday, November 12: The waxing crescent moon passes below Jupiter in the evening sky

Saturday, November 17: First quarter moon (looks like half a moon; half is turned away from us so the Moon is one quarter lit in sunlight in this phase)

Sunday, November 18: Leonid meteor shower

Saturday, November 24: The full Moon passes above the Pleiades star cluster. The full Moon rises at sunset; for the next two weeks the Moon rises about 50 minutes later each night, making it also visible in the morning sky as the Moon orbits toward the direction of the sun.

Tuesday, November 27: The waning Gibbous Moon passes above Mars

Friday, November 30: The waning Gibbous Moon passes below the star Regulus, the brightest star in the constellation of Leo the Lion