Have you ever been out on a very dark, moonless night after all the remnants of sunlight have faded away and noticed a faint triangular shaped glow extending upwards into the sky? This relatively rare phenomenon is called the Zodiacal Light.
David from Chandler, Arizona sent us this picture the other day. He was wondering if our readers could identify this constellation. David says that he took this picture using his Canon EOS 7D. It was around 10pm local time on 1/1/2011. He was facing south and said that the stars were moving from east to west.
We are heading into the heart of winter here in the Northern Hemisphere and the night sky is dominated by the constellation Orion. We’ve talked about Orion in previous posts, so I thought I would concentrate on some of the lesser known constellations that can be seen during the month of January. I’ve also included a handy star chart to guide you along the way.
The 2010 Winter Solstice Total Lunar Eclipse is over and I’m sure we’re all recovering from a serious lack of sleep! What a night! The above photo was submitted by Candace who says she used a Canon Rebel T2i without a telephoto lens to capture the event. As you can see, the moon is completely in the Earth’s shadow – or umbra – and is displaying the characteristic red-orange hue.
The Christmas Star is also known as the Star of Bethlehem. It is a star that, in the Christian tradition, shown brightly for a short period of time and heralded the birth of Christ. We like to stick to the science of the universe here at Outerspace Universe, so let’s explore what may have actually happened 2,000 years ago.