Space Station Threshold

Greetings, fellow SkyWatchers! Are you ready for one terrific weekend? Although the Moon will interfere, one of the year's best meteor showers is about to happen - the Leonids. Will it be the super-storm that produced thousands of meteors as it did a few years ago? Don't hold your breath - [...]

Happy Halloween! Are you ready for the Spook's Tour? Tonight treat your little ghouls and goblins, party guests and yourself to a real sweet treat through your telescope or binoculars as we take a look at some of the season's craziest (and scariest) outer space objects. It's a time honored custom that's sure to [...]

Understanding how stars form is critical to astronomers. If we can gain a better understanding of how intermediate-size infant stars grow, we can begin to answer some of the most perplexing questions hanging over the evolution of our own Solar System. Unfortunately, the nearest star forming regions are about 500 light years away, meaning that ...

Greetings, fellow SkyWatchers! It's Friiiiiiday… And time to head out to the Moon to begin some lunar exploration. Why not? This weekend commemorates Robert Goddard's birthday! While we're rocketing skyward, we'll take a look at a great globular cluster that's easy in both binoculars and telescopes, plus a few ...

Greetings, fellow SkyWatchers! It's a dark sky weekend and a great opportunity to really get to know some unusual deep sky objects - like brilliant open clusters and tiny compact galaxy groups. Even if you just sit outside and stargaze, you might catch a member of the Alpha Aurigid meteor shower! Are [...]

Greetings, fellow SkyWatchers! Are you psyched up for tonight's Pleiades occultation? I am! While the Moon often passes near the ancient cluster, it's not often we get to enjoy such a great event so well placed at a comfortable time of the year. This weekend we'll be watching for ISS passes, [...]

Be sure to mark your calendar for tomorrow night. For lucky observers in northeastern North America, eastern Canada, and western Europe, the evening of September 19-20, 2008 is your opportunity to watch the face of the peaceful gibbous Moon glide across the ancient blue beauty of the Plieades… (...)Read the rest of The [...]

Greetings, fellow SkyWatchers! It's big… It's bright. It's undeniably the Moon. So what are we going to do this weekend? Why, study of course! We'll take a look at some history, some mystery and even some cool variability that can be studied without any special equipment. Are you ready [...]

A strange Kuiper Belt Object (KBO) has been discovered orbiting the Sun in the wrong direction. The object, designated as 2008 KV42 but nicknamed Drac (after Dracula, as vampires are fabled to have the ability to walk on walls), has a highly inclined orbit of 103.5°. Drac is a rarity as very few objects in [...]

Greetings, fellow Skywatchers! The weekend has arrived at last and with it… more lunar challenge studies. Are you ready to dance with the pie-eyed piper as we seek out Piccolomini? You'll find it to the southwest of the shallow ring of Fracastorius on Mare Nectaris' southern shore. How about seeing double as we [...]