Astral Projections Online January 2025
Check our Website for updated content at www.astra-nj.com
Club Presentations Wanted:
Does anyone have any astronomy items of interest to share with the membership?
Please let us know at Club Contacts.
Club dues and membership. If you renew after March 31 you will be renewed as a new member.
ASTRAL PROJECTIONS ONLINE (APO for short) is an email-linked publication for members only. If you exit APO to the club website or other resources you will need to use the emailed link again to get back to it. If you wish to retain a copy please bookmark or refer back to the email. We will make all efforts to post by the first week of the month.
Submissions Welcome: Members are invited to submit articles, photos, news, or stories for inclusion with Astral Projections Online. Please contact the ASTRA Webmaster.
Event Calendar
EVENT Cancellations: Members will receive email notifications of an event cancellation.
Upcoming December ASTRA Meeting
ASTRA's next meeting will be Friday, January 10, 2025, at 7 PM EST. January meeting will be movie night.
Upcoming Star Parties
February 22, 2025 - Jakes Branch - 6 PM
March 1, 2025 - Cloverdale - 6 PM
March 22, 2025 - Jakes Branch - 8 PM
Upcoming Public, County & State Park Presentations 2025
Public Outreach Presentations, if any member wishes to support ASTRA outreach efforts with the public, please let Vinny, Ro, or Jim know of any interest. Additional help for these events is always appreciated.
County and State Park presentations require a registration fee, call the hosting park to reserve.
January 21, 2025 - Cattus Island - 6 PM - Winter Constellations
March 1, 2025 - Cloverdale - 5 PM - Spring Constellations
Website Updates …
Please visit our club website. We continue to have additional updates, if some content would be useful to members please let us know.
Wishing all ASTRA Members, your families, and everyone that has supported us this year, a Happy New Year 2025.
“One of the great things about stargazing is that it’s immediately at hand for so many people. You know, you could get into scuba diving or bird watching, but the stars are always up there.”
Tim Ferriss - Entrepreneur and investor
ASTRA Meeting -
January 10 at 7 PM
Our January meeting will be movie night. We will meet at 7 PM in the planetarium meeting room.
We ask members to support our ASTRA meetings on Astronomy items of interest for presentations for 2025. Please let Jim, Ro, or Vinny know.
Event Reports
No star parties were planned for December.
We will resume star parties in February 2025.
November ASTRA Meeting Summary
For our December 2024 meeting, Jim Webster provided an open discussion presentation on Smart telescopes. Several members have them now and Jim Webster has made an outreach table with his smart telescope the Unistellar Odyseey, shown below, at several star parties. The additional images below are the Dwarf2 and ZWO Seestar S50, followed by the Celestron Origin. Smart telescopes are here to stay, but the main focus for star parties will be the traditional telescopes. In most circles, the Dobsonian telescope should be the first telescope that people should consider for learning the sky.
County Park Presentations
County Park events are in the lineup again with Cattus Island Nature Festival occurring on April 26. Help from the membership has been great for the two times we were able to participate and looking forward to it again. We will have the ASTRA Table and solar observing, weather permitting. In addition DarkSky New Jersey advocates and SciStarter ambassadors will have another table, making our event corner the biggest. Images below are from 2024.
The next event would be Ocean Fun Day at Island Beach State Park on May 17, with one table setup and solar observing, weather permitting.
Members Submitted Articles & Items
Whatever it is, how you tell your story online can make all the difference.
Contact: Jim Webster, ASTRA President and Webmaster, regarding submissions.
ASTRA member, Vic Palmieri submitted the following for this month’s APO:
T Coronae Borealis 'Blaze Star' nova event | BBC Sky at Night Magazine
Solar activity has been very much in the news lately. Unfortunately with the rain and stormy weather for December 31, we locally missed the Arura in our part of New Jersey. To keep an eye on it go to spaceweather.com.
NASA Asteroid Watch - Want to keep an eye on Near Earth Asteroids? NASA has a webpage just for this. You may need to refresh the page to keep it fresh, but well worth it. The program tracks up to five asteroids at a time. Eyes On Astroids.
The Moon: Our Nearest Neighbor
Let’s explore some interesting features, facts, or myths about our nearest neighbor, the Moon. Without it, life on Earth would be totally different, if not at all.
New Craters ???
NASA’s LRO – the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter – spacecraft imaged a new crater on the Moon’s surface that is likely the impact site of Russia’s Luna 25 mission.
NASA’s LRO – the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter – spacecraft imaged a new crater on the Moon’s surface that is likely the impact site of Russia’s Luna 25 mission.
During its descent, Luna 25 experienced an anomaly that caused it to impact the surface of the Moon on Aug. 19, 2023.
This GIF alternates between LRO views from June 27, 2020, and Aug. 24, 2023 – before and after the appearance of a new impact crater likely from Russia’s Luna 25 mission.
For more on this visit nasa.gov
Outreach material below is distributed free for public outreach.
Around The Web
Dark Sky News
Dark Sky New Jersey's presentation on December 10 was well received on the impact of light pollution in and around New Jersey for the Association of New Jersey Environmental Commissions. We had over 50 people in attendance.
State Bill A2196
The New Jersey State Lighting Bill is back with the New Jersey state assembly with some modifications that were made to the bill. For more information the link to the bill is available: https://www.njleg.state.nj.us/bill-search/2024/A2196
On the lighter side of astronomy …
What’s Up:
Sky Watching Tips from NASA
Provided by NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory. Is usually updated anywhere from the first day of the month to the fifth day of the month. Check back to this linked image if it hasn’t been updated yet.
For more go to NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory webpage: What’s Up: Skywatching Tips From NASA
This article and images are distributed by NASA Night Sky Network
The Night Sky Network program supports astronomy clubs across the USA dedicated to astronomy outreach.
Visit nightsky.jpl.nasa.gov to find local clubs, events, and more!
January’s Night Sky Notes:
The Red Planet
By Kat Troche
Have you looked up at the night sky this season and noticed a bright object sporting a reddish hue to the left of Orion? This is none other than the planet Mars! January will be an excellent opportunity to spot this planet and some of its details with a medium-sized telescope. Be sure to catch these three events this month.
NASA’s Perseverance Mars rover took this selfie, made up of 62 individual images, on July 23. A rock nicknamed “Cheyava Falls,” which has features that may bear on the question of whether the Red Planet was long ago home to microscopic life, is to the left of the rover near the center of the image. Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/MSSS
Martian Retrograde
Mars entered retrograde (or backward movement relative to its usual direction) on December 7, 2024, and will continue throughout January into February 23, 2025. You can track the planet’s progress by sketching or photographing Mars’ position relative to nearby stars. Be consistent with your observations, taking them every few nights or so as the weather permits. You can use free software like Stellarium or Stellarium Web (the browser version) to help you navigate the night as Mars treks around the sky. You can find Mars above the eastern horizon after 8:00 PM local time.
This mid-January chart shows the path of Mars from September 2024 to June 2025 as it enters and then exits in retrograde motion. Mars appears to change its direction of motion in the sky because Earth is passing the slower-moving Mars in its orbit. Credit: Stellarium
Hide and Seek
On the night of January 13th, you can watch Mars ‘disappear’ behind the Moon during an occultation. An occultation is when one celestial object passes directly in front of another, hiding the background object from view. This can happen with planets and stars in our night sky, depending on the orbit of an object and where you are on Earth, similar to eclipses.
A simulated view of the Moon as Mars begins its occultation on January 13, 2025. Credit: Stellarium
Depending on where you are within the contiguous United States, you can watch this event with the naked eye, binoculars, or a small telescope. The occultation will happen for over an hour in some parts of the US. You can use websites like Stellarium Web or the Astronomical League’s ‘Moon Occults Mars’ chart to calculate the best time to see this event.
Closer and Closer
As you observe Mars this month to track its retrograde movement, you will notice that it will increase in brightness. This is because Mars will reach opposition by the evening of January 16th. Opposition happens when a planet is directly opposite the Sun, as seen from Earth. You don’t need to be in any specific city to observe this event; you only need clear skies to observe that it gets brighter. It’s also when Mars is closest to Earth, so you’ll see more details in a telescope.
Want a quick and easy way to illustrate what opposition is for Jupiter, Saturn, Mars, or other outer worlds? Follow the instructions on our Toolkit Hack: Illustrating Opposition with Exploring the Solar System page using our Exploring Our Solar System activity!
A mosaic of the Valles Marineris hemisphere of Mars projected into point perspective, a view similar to that which one would see from a spacecraft. The mosaic is composed of 102 Viking Orbiter images of Mars. Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech
Mars has fascinated humanity for centuries, with its earliest recorded observations dating back to the Bronze Age. By the 17th century, astronomers were able to identify features of the Martian surface, such as its ice caps and darker regions. Since the 1960s, exploration of the Red Planet has intensified with robotic missions from various space organizations. Currently, NASA has five active missions, including rovers and orbiters, with the future focused on human exploration and habitation. Mars will always fill us with a sense of wonder and adventure as we reach for its soil through initiatives such as the Moon to Mars Architecture and the Mars Sample Return campaign.
Let’s Explore Space - What’s in the Sky January 2025
Orion The Hunter
Winter is here! And with the passing seasons, brings new constellations into our evening night skies. During the winter months, it is the mighty hunter Orion who takes the center stage as the prominent constellation this time of year.
The constellation and surrounding areas are rich in deep sky objects to observe.
Orion is a prominent constellation that's one of the brightest and most familiar sights in the night sky. Straddling the celestial equator it can be seen from all locations on Earth. Named after a great hunter in Greek mythology, it contains two first magnitude stars, many other bright stars, a famous belt, spectacular nebulae, some impressive multiple stars and fine open clusters. Its most famous inhabitant, the Orion Nebula, is one of the most spectacular deep sky objects in the sky. Best seen in December, January and February.
For more go to freecharts.com
and Wyoming Stargazing
Tonight’s Sky: January
In January, the northern hemisphere features beautiful views of Capella, a pair of giant yellow stars; Aldebaran, a red giant star; and two-star clusters—the Hyades and the Pleiades. Keep watching for the awe-inspiring space-based views of the Crab Nebula, the remains of a star that exploded as a supernova.
Visit the STScI which produces Hubblesite.org video overviews for Tonight’s Sky.
They can be found both on Facebook and stsci.edu.
Submissions Welcome
Members are invited to submit articles, photos, news, or stories for inclusion with Astral Projections Online. Please contact the ASTRA Webmaster.