Oh Say Can You See...

Just a quicky post tonight - we were out looking for the Space Shuttle (last night in orbit tonight - landing tomorrow, 31 July), and the International Space Station, both making a pass close to 8pm. We never saw the Shuttle - it likely is maneuvering for it's landing tomorrow and passed too early for us to spot. But the Shuttle was bright, even though it only rose 19 degrees off the SW horizon and was over 900 km (550 miles) downrange of us, and was easily spotted in the bright twilight. I tried an exposure, but was late getting out and didn't do a good job of recording it - I promise better in the future!


But in the deepening twilight, other bright stars played peek-a-boo with a few light clouds softly lit by the rosy glow of the sunset nearly an hour earlier. Here is an exposure (cropped from a 24mm lens, 30 seconds, F/4, ISO 400) of an asterism everyone knows currently high in the Northwest. Can you spot it (click the image for a larger view)?


For those who need a little help, the giveaway is the arc of 4 stars above leading to a bowl of 4 stars among the clouds. Yes, the Big Dipper is high in the NW sky and is easily spotted even from town. The Dipper is an asterism - a pattern of stars that is not a constellation. What's that you say - the Big Dipper is a constellation? Actually no, it is part of the much larger constellation Ursa Major, or Big Bear, the dipper and handle forming part of the Bear's hindquarters and long tail. To see all of Ursa Major, you need a pretty dark sky, but the dipper is easy to spot, and is visible all year long from the northern part of the country. From here in Arizona it will dip below our northern horizon in the early evening in a few months, thanks to our southern latitude and the curved surface of the earth....