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2014 Aussie sky guide

Blood red moons, a partial eclipse of the Sun, comets and meteor showers ... just some of the special sky treats to catch this year. Astroblogger Ian Musgrave gives the lowdown on when and how to get the best view.

Almost every night the night sky has something to entertain you, but sometimes we can see some very special events. 2014 is no exception. This year we have a good partial solar eclipse; two total lunar eclipses; at least two, possibly three comets that will be visible through binoculars; and couple of nice meteor showers.

Not only that, we get to see three rare occultations of Saturn, where the Moon passes in front of the ringed planet. True, one of them occurs in the daytime and you'll need binoculars or a small telescope to see it, but we typically see an occultation of Saturn less than once every 10 or so years, and now three come along at once.

So here's a quick rundown on what we can expect to see in 2014.

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Eclipses

On 29 April an annular eclipse, where the Moon does not fully cover the Sun, sweeps over Antarctica, and a partial solar eclipse will be visible across Australia.

The partial solar eclipse occurs close to sunset and in some places such as Sydney and Brisbane the sun sets during maximum partial eclipse. This is an excellent opportunity to get dramatic images of the 'crescent' sun setting. You will need to use special solar glasses or safe solar projection techniques to watch the eclipse. Start and mid eclipse times vary substantially from place to place (for example, in Adelaide maximum eclipse is 4:37 pm ACST — equivalent to 5:07 AEST, while in Hobart the maximum is 5:00 AEST), so it's best to start observing a bit before the predicted start.

Total lunar eclipses occur when the Earth's shadow falls directly across the Moon. The moon appears a shade of coppery-red because the Earth's atmosphere refracts light from the Sun so our shadow is not entirely dark. Our atmosphere absorbs blue and green light so red is left in our shadow.

Unlike the solar eclipse, lunar eclipses occur at pretty much the same equivalent local times (for example, the 8 October eclipse is at its maximum at 5:46 pm AEST, 5:15 pm ACST and 4:14 AWST.

Lunar eclipses last for around three hours from the time the Moon first touches the umbra until it exists. Totality, unlike a solar eclipse which lasts minutes at most, last for around an hour. The start and finish times given in the table above are for when the umbra (the darkest part of Earth's shadow) first touches and leaves the Moon respectively.

The 15 April eclipse occurs mostly at twilight in the eastern and central states (Western Australia misses out entirely). Although it occurs in the twilight, it will still be interesting to watch. The eclipsed moon at twilight has an entirely different look to a normal rising Moon with the pearly light replaced with a coppery-red glow.

The 8 October eclipse occurs at a decent time to show the kids, and the eclipse is reasonably dark.

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Occultation of Saturn

Although the 22 February occultation occurs in daylight, it is readily visible (if rather washed out) in binoculars or a small telescope. The Moon and Saturn are far from the Sun, but do use due care to make sure you cannot accidentally view the Sun while setting up.

The Moon is a very obvious signpost when looking at these events, Saturn will be the brightest object near the Moon. Start watching about half an hour beforehand to get set up and familiar with the sky. Although you will be able to easily see the May and August events with the unaided eye, they are best seen in a small telescope so you can see the ringed world in detail as it vanishes behind the Moon. In August you can see Saturn's Moon Titan go behind the Moon as well. Perth gets an extra grazing encounter on June 11 at 04:13 AWST.

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Comets

September and October is prime comet viewing time when three comets become bright enough to view in binoculars, and two may even be bright enough to view with the unaided eye in dark sky areas. They will be faint fuzzy dots to be sure, but faint fuzzy dots from the depths of space.

Unlike periodic comets such as Halley, or 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko (which will be orbited by the Rosetta Spacecraft this year) which orbit the sun on time scales of years to centuries, these three comets are either first-time visitors to the inner solar system, or have orbits on the order of tens of thousands of years.

Comet C/ 2012 K1 PanSTARRS

Comet C/2012 K1 PanSTARRS will be magnitude 6 (which is just on the limit of unaided eye detection under dark skies) in September and October, and a purely southern skies object in binoculars in November. At its brightest it is crossing the constellations of Hydra, Pyxis and Puppis in the eastern morning skies. It will pass very close to some bright clusters while in Puppis, the fading sail above the Large Magellanic cloud.

Comet C/2013 V5 Oukaimaden and C/2013 A1 Siding Spring

C/2013 V5 Oukaimaden may be magnitude 5 in September and magnitude 6 in October (or it may pull a ISON and be completely unobservable to the unaided eye). It is a purely southern skies object at its brightest, crossing Puppis, Pxyis and Hydra in the morning skies in September (in the opposite direction to Comet C/ 2012 K1 PanSTARRS, passing above PanSTARRS in the morning sky in early September) to arrive in the evening skies below C/2013 A1 Siding Spring in late September. In late October the rapidly fading comet passes with binocular range of Saturn.

C/2013 A1 Siding Spring is magnitude 7 in September, and magnitude 8 (so you'll need strong binoculars or a telescope to see it) in October. However, in October the comet passes only 120,000 kilometres from Mars, and Mars may be enveloped in the comet's coma. A fleet of spacecraft around Mars will be observing this closely. From Earth, Mars and the comet are less than 0.3° apart. Amateur telescopes with wide field eyepieces can see them together. At its brightest the comet is easily located in the tail of Scorpius, then Sagittarius, passing close to some beautiful clusters and nebula for its Martian rendezvous.

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Meteor showers

Meteor showers occur when streams of dust released from comets (the Orionids are produced by dust from Halley's comet, unusually in the case of the Geminids it's the asteroid 3200 Phaethon that has generated the dust).

There are several iconic meteor showers that are not listed here, like the Perseids (in August) and Leonids (in November) because they are too far north of us to see, or will have very poor activity this year. The rates are given for observation under dark sky conditions in the early morning, when the meteor showers point of origin is highest in the sky.

People in northern Australia generally see much higher rates than southern Australia for these showers as the meteor showers' point of origin is much higher in the sky, and half the meteors are not being blocked by the horizon. For example, in 2013 the Geminids were very poor in southern Australia, while folks in Darwin saw an outstanding display.

To see the meteors generally look north from 1 am in the morning, although rates are better for the Aquarids and Geminids around 3 - 4 am.

About the author: Dr Ian Musgrave is an avid amateur astronomer. He writes the weekly sky updates for ABC Science and is science adviser to iTelescope.net. When not staring at the sky he is an equally enthusiastic molecular pharmacologist at the University of Adelaide, Australia. You can follow him on Astroblog for daily posts about astronomy, biology and life, the Universe and everything.



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