Astronomy Picture of the Day

Discover the cosmos! Each day a different image or photograph of our fascinating universe is featured, along with a brief explanation written by a professional astronomer.

2021 November 25

At the Shadow’s Edge

Image Credit & Copyright: Jean-Francois Gout

Explanation: Shaped like a cone tapering into space, the Earth’s dark central shadow or umbra has a circular cross-section. It’s wider than the Moon at the distance of the Moon’s orbit though. But during the lunar eclipse of November 18/19, part of the Moon remained just outside the umbral shadow. The successive pictures in this composite of 5 images from that almost total lunar eclipse were taken over a period of about 1.5 hours. The series is aligned to trace part of the cross-section’s circular arc, with the central image at maximum eclipse. It shows a bright, thin sliver of the lunar disk still beyond the shadow’s curved edge. Of course, even within the shadow the Moon’s surface is not completely dark, reflecting the reddish hues of filtered sunlight scattered into the shadow by Earth’s atmosphere.

Notable APOD Submissions: Lunar Eclipse of 2021 November 19

November 24 Daily Correspondence Digest for the Northern Hemisphere’s Moon Phase and Planetary Positions

You can use this link to go forward or backward in time for Moon phase information. If you are curious you can even find out what phase the Moon was in when you or anyone else, you know was on the date the person was born.

From Moongiant.com

The Moon’s current phase for today and tonight is a Waning Gibbous Phase. This is the first phase after the Full Moon occurs. It lasts roughly 7 days with the Moon’s illumination growing smaller each day until the Moon becomes a Last Quarter Moon with an illumination of 50%. The average Moon rise for this phase is between 9pm and Midnight depending on the age of the phase. The moon rises later and later each night setting after sunrise in the morning. During this phase the Moon can also be seen in the early morning daylight hours on the western horizon.

Visit the November 2021 Moon Phases Calendar to see all the daily moon phase for this month.

Today’s Waning Gibbous Phase

The Waning Gibbous on November 24 has an illumination of 78%. This is the percentage of the Moon illuminated by the Sun. The illumination is constantly changing and can vary up to 10% a day. On November 24 the Moon is 19.34 days old. This refers to how many days it has been since the last New Moon. It takes 29.53 days for the Moon to orbit the Earth and go through the lunar cycle of all 8 Moon phases.

The 8 Lunar Phases

There are 8 lunar phases the Moon goes through in its 29.53 days lunar cycle. The 4 major Moon phases are Full Moon, New Moon, First Quarter and Last Quarter. Between these major phases, there are 4 minor ones: the Waxing Crescent, Waxing Gibbous, Waning Gibbous and Waning Crescent. For more info on the Moon Cycle and on each phase check out Wikipedia Lunar Phase page.

Phase Details

Phase: Waning Gibbous
Illumination: 78%
Moon Age: 19.34 days
Moon Angle: 0.50
Moon Distance: 399,209.11 km
Sun Angle: 0.54
Sun Distance: 147,669,592.26 km

Useful Moon Resources

Check the weather before a night of Moon gazing at weather.com

For a list of all the current meteor showers visit American Meteor Society

If you need to calculate the planetary positions for a specific use and time, click on this link

Currentplanetarypositions.com

To figure out GMT (Greenwich Mean Time) to your local time use this link

For Your Local Time and Date

Northeastern Hemisphere

The time for the Custom Planetary Positions is from the local time in Frankfurt, Germany, Europe

24 November 2021
04:00 pm GMT 5:00 PM CEST
Zodiac: Tropical (Standard Western)

Sun:02 Sagittarius 35
Moon:00 Leo 01
Mercury:00 Sagittarius 02
Venus:16 Capricorn 19
Mars:17 Scorpio 01
Jupiter:24 Aquarius 36
Saturn:08 Aquarius 30
Uranus:12 Taurus 00 Rx
Neptune:20 Pisces 25 Rx
Pluto:24 Capricorn 53
True Lunar Node:01 Gemini 42 Rx
Mean Lunar Node:01 Gemini 30 Rx
Lilith (Black Moon):14 Gemini 19
Chiron:08 Aries 43 Rx
Ceres:05 Gemini 42 Rx
Pallas:09 Pisces 50
Juno:03 Capricorn 25
Vesta:04 Sagittarius 22
Eris:23 Aries 53 Rx

Fire:6
Earth:4
Air:6
Water:3

Cardinal:5
Fixed:5
Mutable:9

Northwestern Hemisphere

The time for the Custom Planetary Positions is from the local time in Chicago, Illinois, USA

November 24, 2021
11:00 pm GMT 5:00 PM CST
Zodiac: Tropical (Standard Western)

Sun:02 Sagittarius 53
Moon:03 Leo 33
Mercury:00 Sagittarius 29
Venus:16 Capricorn 32
Mars:17 Scorpio 13
Jupiter:24 Aquarius 38
Saturn:08 Aquarius 31
Uranus:11 Taurus 59 Rx
Neptune:20 Pisces 25 Rx
Pluto:24 Capricorn 54
True Lunar Node:01 Gemini 42 Rx
Mean Lunar Node:01 Gemini 30 Rx
Lilith (Black Moon):14 Gemini 21
Chiron:08 Aries 43 Rx
Ceres:05 Gemini 37 Rx
Pallas:09 Pisces 52
Juno:03 Capricorn 32
Vesta:04 Sagittarius 31
Eris:23 Aries 53 Rx

Fire:6
Earth:4
Air:6
Water:3

Cardinal:5
Fixed:5
Mutable:9

When Isis Was Queen

Ancient Egyptian Goddess Isis and God Osiris

At the ancient Egyptian temples of Philae, Nubians gave new life to a vanishing religious tradition.

Hathor.When the Romans conquered Egypt in 30 B.C., the country’s system of temples, which had sustained religious traditions dating back more than 3,000 years, began to slowly wither away. Starved of the funds that pharaohs traditionally supplied to religious institutions, priests lost their vocation and temples fell into disuse throughout the country. The introduction of Christianity in the first century a.d. only hastened this process. But there was one exception to this trend: In the temples on the island of Philae in the Nile River, rites dedicated to the goddess Isis and the god Osiris continued to be celebrated in high style for some 500 years after the Roman conquest. This final flowering of ancient Egyptian religion was only possible because of the piety and support of Egypt’s neighbors to the south, the Nubians.

Philae lies just south of the Nile’s first cataract—one of six rapids along the river—which marked the historical border between ancient Egypt and Nubia, also known as Kush. In this region of Kush, called Lower Nubia, the temple complex at Philae was just one of many that were built on islands in the Nile and along its banks. Throughout the long history of Egypt and Nubia, Lower Nubia was a kind of buffer zone between these two lands and a place…

November 24 On This Date in History

Today’s Important Historical Events

380 Theodosius I makes his adventus, or first formal entry, into Constantinople

1639 1st observation of transit of Venus by Jeremiah Horrocks and William Crabtree – helped establish size of the Solar System

1642 Dutch explorer Abel Tasman discovers Van Diemen’s Land (Tasmania)

1859 English naturalist Charles Darwin publishes “On the Origin of Species” radically changing the view of evolution and laying the foundation for evolutionary biology

1950 UN troops begin an assault intending to end Korean War by Christmas

1954 France sends 20,000 soldiers to Algeria

1974 Most complete early human skeleton (Lucy, Australopithecus) discovered by Donald Johanson, Maurice Taieb, Yves Coppens and Tim White in the Middle Awash of Ethiopia’s Afar Depression [1] [2]

Today’s Historical Events

380 Theodosius I makes his adventus, or first formal entry, into Constantinople

496 Anastasius II succeeds Gelasius I as Catholic Pope

642 Theodore I begins his reign as Catholic Pope

1105 Rabbi Nathan ben Yehiel of Rome completes Talmudic dictionary

1434 River Thames in London freezes over

1542 Battle of Solway Moss: English beat Scottish King James V

1587 Battle at Auneau: Henri de Guise wins

1601 Earl Mauritius ceases siege of De Bosch due to strict monarchy

Today’s Historical Events in Film and TV

1936 Noël Coward‘s anthology “Tonight at 8:30” premieres in NYC, runs for 118 performances

1947 The US House of Representatives Committee on Un-American Activities finds “Hollywood 10” in contempt because of their refusal to reveal whether they were communists

1948 WAVE TV channel 3 in Louisville, Kentucky (NBC) begins broadcasting

1948 “Bicycle Thieves”, Italian film directed by Vittorio De Sica, starring himself and Cesare Zavattini, is released (Honorary Academy Award 1950)

1966 The cult classic “One Million Years B.C.”, starring Raquel Welch, is released 1st in West Germany

1979 “Salem’s Lot”, American two-part miniseries based on the horror novel of the same name by Stephen King, concludes in the United States

1985 NBC miniseries “Mussolini: The Untold Story” starring George C. Scott premieres in the US

1991 CFL Grey Cup, Winnipeg Stadium: Toronto Argonauts defeat Calgary Stampeders, 36-21; Argos under new ownership of LA Kings owner Bruce McNall, hockey player Wayne Gretzky and actor John Candy

Today’s Historical Music Events

1800 Weber’s opera “Das Waldmadchen” premieres in Freiburg

1950 “Guys & Dolls” opens at 46th St Theater NYC for 1200 performances

1951 “17” closes at Broadhurst Theater NYC after 180 performances

1951 “Music in the Air” closes at Ziegfeld Theater NYC after 56 performances

1956 “Pajama Game” closes at St James Theater NYC after 1063 performances

1966 The Beatles began recording sessions for their album “Sgt.Pepper’s lonely hearts Club Band”

1975 “Boccaccio” opens at Edison Theater NYC for 7 performances

1986 “Smile” opens at Lunt-Fontanne Theater NYC for 48 performances

Today’s Historical Events in Sports

1897 Canadian Intercollegiate Rugby Football Union forms in Kingston

1934 CFL Grey Cup: Sarnia Imperials win their first Championship with a 20-12 win over Regina Roughriders

1938 National Semi-Pro Basketball Congress authorizes yellow basketball

1949 Syracuse Nationals beat Anderson Packers, 125-123 in 5 OTs

1951 CFL Grey Cup, Varsity Stadium, Toronto: Ottawa Rough Riders claim their 4th Championship with 21-14 win over Saskatchewan Roughriders

1953 Los Angeles Dodgers sign Walter Alston to a 1-year pact as manager for 1954; signs 23 one year agreements until 1976

1956 CFL Grey Cup, Varsity Stadium, Toronto: Edmonton Eskimos make it 3rd consecutive Championships; defeat Montreal Alouettes for 3rd straight year, 50-27

1956 Americans go 1-2 in the men’s 100m final at the Melbourne Olympics; Bobby Morrow and Thane Baker both record hand-timed 10.50s but automatic timing gives gold medal to Morrow

Astronomy Picture of the Day

Discover the cosmos! Each day a different image or photograph of our fascinating universe is featured, along with a brief explanation written by a professional astronomer.

2021 November 24

Pleiades: The Seven Sisters Star Cluster

Image Credit & Copyright: Damien Cannane

Explanation: Have you ever seen the Pleiades star cluster? Even if you have, you probably have never seen it as large and clear as this. Perhaps the most famous star cluster on the sky, the bright stars of the Pleiades can be seen without binoculars from even the depths of a light-polluted city. With a long exposure from a dark location, though, the dust cloud surrounding the Pleiades star cluster becomes very evident. The featured exposure, taken from Florida, USA, covers a sky area several times the size of the full moon. Also known as the Seven Sisters and M45, the Pleiades lies about 400 light years away toward the constellation of the Bull (Taurus). A common legend with a modern twist is that one of the brighter stars faded since the cluster was named, leaving only six of the sister stars visible to the unaided eye. The actual number of Pleiades stars visible, however, may be more or less than seven, depending on the darkness of the surrounding sky and the clarity of the observer’s eyesight.

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