[Upbeat music]
[Preston] What's Up for May?
The planets of dusk and dawn, a lunar eclipse
and the Coma star cluster.
May begins and ends
with a couple of great planet-spotting opportunities.
On May 2nd, look to the west about 45 minutes after sunset
to find Mercury about 10 degrees off the horizon, accompanied
by a slim crescent moon.
Just to the south of the Moon
is brilliant red giant star Aldebaran,
which should be roughly the same brightness as Mercury.
And by the way, this is the only chance
to spot a naked-eye planet in the early evening until August.
Then in the last week of May,
you can watch each morning as Jupiter
and Mars get increasingly close
in the pre-dawn sky.
Their morning meetup culminates in a close conjunction
that you can watch on the 28th through the 30th, where
they'll be separated by barely the width of the full moon.
Should look incredible
with binoculars
where you can also see Jupiter's largest moons.
Sky watchers in
the Western Hemisphere can look forward
to a total lunar eclipse in mid-May.
The event will be visible across the Americas,
Europe and Africa.
Basically anywhere the Moon is visible
above the horizon at the time.
The visible part of the eclipse begins about 10:30 p.m. U.S.
Eastern Time on May 15th, with totality starting an hour later
and lasting for about an hour and a half.
Those in the Eastern U.S.
will see the eclipse
start with the Moon well above the horizon.
For the Central U.S.
the eclipse starts about an hour and a half
after dark, with the Moon relatively low in the sky.
On the West coast of the U.S., the Moon rises with totality
beginning or already underway,
so you'll want to find a clear view
toward the southeast, if viewing from there.
Now, lunar eclipses
are the ones that are safe to look at directly with your eyes
or binoculars or a telescope (unlike solar eclipses).
The Moon takes on a dim,
reddish hue during the period of totality.
Even though the Moon is fully immersed in Earth's shadow
at that time,
red wavelengths
of sunlight filter through Earth's atmosphere
and fall onto the Moon's surface.
One way to think of this is that a total lunar eclipse
shows us a projection of all the sunrises
and sunsets happening on the planet at that moment.
So check your local details for this eclipse and find lots
more eclipse info from NASA at the address on your screen.
Finally in May, a really nice target
for binoculars: the Coma star cluster.
This loose, open star cluster displays 40 or 50 stars
spread over a region of sky, about three finger-widths wide.
The brightest stars in the cluster
form a distinctive Y shape, as seen here.
The Coma star cluster is located
about 300 light years away,
making it the second closest open cluster to Earth
after the Hyades cluster in Taurus.
To find the Coma star cluster
look southward for the constellation Leo.
It can be easiest to start from the Big Dipper toward the north
and use the two "pointer stars" on the end,
which always point you toward Leo.
Once you've identified Leo,
the Coma star cluster
is about 15 degrees to the east
of the triangle of stars
representing the lion's hindquarters.
It's relatively easy to find with binoculars, even under
light-polluted urban skies, as long as it's clear out.
So here's wishing you
clear skies for finding the Coma
star cluster and any other wonders
you discover in the night sky in May.
Here are the phases
of the Moon for May.
Stay up to date with all of NASA's missions
to explore the solar system and beyond at nasa.gov.
I'm Preston Dyches from NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory.
And that's What's Up for this month.