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| This web site is a joint venture of the
Fairbanks Museum & Planetarium and
Vermont Public Radio with support from the Partnership
for a Nation of Learners, a Corporation for Public Broadcasting and Institute of Museum and Library
Services leadership initiative. |
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March Skies 2010
Seasons are changing, both in the weather and in the March sky as well. Winter's champion, Orion, is tipping into the southwestern skies, still a great view in the evenings. The Big Dipper, after a winter near the northern horizon, climbs noticeably into the northeast, and following the arc of the handle, it will guide you to the rising star Arcturus in the northeast. Venus slowly returns to the western skies, bright but quite low in the west during the last week of the month. Mars is bright and high in the south, and Saturn climbs into the eastern skies.
10 - Look to the right of the "handle" of the Big Dipper, in the direction of Leo, the Lion, where strewn across the sky is a wispy group of stars called Coma Berenices, or "Berenices’ hair". These stars are due east about 8:50 PM EDT, about 40 degrees above the horizon.
11 – Mars ends its retrograde motion to the west tonight. This apparent “backwards” motion is actually the result of the Earth traveling faster than Mars, and passing our neighboring planet starting last December. Mars will resume moving east against the background of stars for the rest of the year.
12 – The brightest star in Leo, the Lion is called Regulus, and is due south 10:35 PM EST, with the planet Saturn, brighter, well to its left. Regulus in Latin means "Little King", a step down from its original name "Rex", referring to it as the ruler of the heavens in pre-Christian times.
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