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 December 29

Giant Storms and High Clouds on Jupiter

Image Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/SwRI/MSSS; Processing & License: Kevin M. Gill

Explanation: What and where are these large ovals? They are rotating storm clouds on Jupiter imaged last month by NASA’s Juno spacecraft. In general, higher clouds are lighter in color, and the lightest clouds visible are the relatively small clouds that dot the lower oval. At 50 kilometers across, however, even these light clouds are not small. They are so high up that they cast shadows on the swirling oval below. The featured image has been processed to enhance color and contrast. Large ovals are usually regions of high pressure that span over 1000 kilometers and can last for years. The largest oval on Jupiter is the Great Red Spot (not pictured), which has lasted for at least hundreds of years. Studying cloud dynamics on Jupiter with Juno images enables a better understanding of dangerous typhoons and hurricanes on Earth.

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29 December Daily Correspondence Digest for the Southern 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 Crescent phase. In this phase the Moon’s illumination is growing smaller each day until the New Moon. During this part of the Moon cycle, the Moon is getting closer to the Sun as viewed from Earth and the night side of the Moon is facing the Earth with only a small edge of the Moon being illuminated. This phase is best viewed an hour or 2 before the sunrise and can be quite beautiful if you’re willing to get up early. It can also be a great time to see the features of the Moon’s surface. Along the edge where the illuminated portion meets the dark side, the craters and mountains cast long shadows making them easier to observe with a telescope or binoculars.

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

Today’s Waning Crescent Phase

The Waning Crescent on December 28 has an illumination of 35%. 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 December 28 the Moon is 23.59 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 Crescent
Illumination: 35%
Moon Age: 23.59 days
Moon Angle: 0.54
Moon Distance: 370,965.10 km
Sun Angle: 0.54
Sun Distance: 147,109,039.38 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

Southeastern Hemisphere

The time for this Custom Planetary Positions is from the local time in Melbourne, Victoria, Australia

29 December 2021
06:00 am GMT 5:00 PM AEDT
Zodiac: Tropical (Standard Western)

Sun:07 Capricorn 44
Moon:05 Scorpio 08
Mercury:24 Capricorn 10
Venus:24 Capricorn 31 Rx
Mars:11 Sagittarius 09
Jupiter:00 Pisces 01
Saturn:11 Aquarius 36
Uranus:11 Taurus 00 Rx
Neptune:20 Pisces 37
Pluto:25 Capricorn 51

True Lunar Node:01 Gemini 12

Mean Lunar Node:29 Taurus 41 Rx
Lilith (Black Moon):18 Gemini 09
Chiron:08 Aries 29
Ceres:28 Taurus 55 Rx
Pallas:15 Pisces 47
Juno:16 Capricorn 19
Vesta:23 Sagittarius 03

Eris:23 Aries 42 Rx

Fire:4

Earth:8
Air:3
Water:4

Cardinal:7
Fixed:5
Mutable:7

Southwestern Hemisphere

The time for this Custom Planetary Positions is from the local time in Sao Paulo, Brazil, South America

29 December 2021
08:00 pm GMT 5:00 PM BRT
Zodiac: Tropical (Standard Western)

Sun:08 Capricorn 19
Moon:13 Scorpio 29
Mercury:25 Capricorn 02
Venus:24 Capricorn 16 Rx
Mars:11 Sagittarius 34
Jupiter:00 Pisces 08
Saturn:11 Aquarius 40
Uranus:10 Taurus 59 Rx
Neptune:20 Pisces 38
Pluto:25 Capricorn 52

True Lunar Node:01 Gemini 13
Mean Lunar Node:29 Taurus 39 Rx
Lilith (Black Moon):18 Gemini 13
Chiron:08 Aries 29
Ceres:28 Taurus 51 Rx
Pallas:15 Pisces 56
Juno:16 Capricorn 33
Vesta:23 Sagittarius 22
Eris:23 Aries 42 Rx

Fire:4
Earth:8
Air:3
Water:4

Cardinal:7
Fixed:5
Mutable:7

An Easy Printable Spell to Release Your Troubles

December 28 Today In History

Today’s Important Historical Events

1065 Westminster Abbey Consecrated in London

1612 First observation of Neptune – Galileo observes and records a “fixed star” without realising it is a planet

1767 King Taksin crowned King of Thailand and establishes Thonburi as his capital

1836 Spain recognizes the independence of Mexico

1860 Harriet Tubman arrives in Auburn, New York, on her last mission to free slaves, having evaded capture for 8 years on the Underground Railroad

1908 Earthquake strikes Messina in Italy, killing nearly 80,000

1943 All Kalmyk inhabitants of the Republic of Kalmukkie deported by the Soviet Union to Central Asia and Siberia. Many die en route.

Today’s Historical Events

418 St Boniface I begins his reign as Catholic Pope

801 Louis the Vrome occupies Barcelona

1065 Westminster Abbey Consecrated in London

1308 The reign of Emperor Hanazono, Emperor of Japan, begins

1612 First observation of Neptune – Galileo observes and records a “fixed star” without realising it is a planet

1614 Sperm whale beached at Noordwijk

1732 Benjamin Franklin under the pseudonym Richard Saunders begins publication of “Poor Richard’s Almanack”

1767 King Taksin crowned King of Thailand and establishes Thonburi as his capital

Today’s Historical Events in Film and TV

1895 Filmmakers the Lumiere brothers, hold the first commercial film screening at Salon Indien du Grand Café, Paris

1927 Arthur Honegger‘s opera “Antigone” premieres with a libretto by Jean Cocteau, sets by Pablo Picasso and costumes by Coco Chanel at the Théâtre Royal de la Monnaie, Brussels

1934 Film “Bright Eyes” premieres starring Shirley Temple and featuring the song “On the Good Ship Lollipop”

1949 20th Century Fox announces it will produce TV programs

1953 WLBT TV channel 3 in Jackson, MS (NBC) begins broadcasting

1954 KEPR TV channel 19 in Pasco-Kennewick-Richl, WA (CBS) 1st broadcast

1956 Miss Frances [Horwich], last Ding Dong School on NBC-TV

1957 CBS states it won’t broadcast baseball where minor league games are on

Today’s Historical Music Events

1821 Composer Gioachino Rossini moves to Bologna

1910 Opera “Konigskinder” is produced (NYC)

1925 George and Ira Gershwin‘s musical “Tip-Toes” premieres in New York City

1928 Ma Rainey, “Mother of the Blues” makes her last record “Big Feelin’ Blues”

1944 Leonard Bernstein‘s musical “On the Town” premieres in NYC

1958 Chipmunks (Alvin, Simon & Theodore with David Seville) hits #1

1963 “Double Dublin” closes at Little Theater NYC after 4 performances

1963 “Jennie” closes at Majestic Theater NYC after 82 performances

Today’s Historical Events in Sports

1887 John Layton Jarvis becomes first British race horse trainer to be knighted for services to racing

1905 Intercollegiate Athletic Association of US founded (becomes NCAA in 1910)

1918 Montreal’s Georges Vezina becomes the first NHL goalie to record an assist during the Canadiens’ 6-3 win over the Toronto Arenas

1934 First ever Women’s cricket international begins England vs Australia in Australia

1938 Paul Gibb scores 106 on Test Cricket debut v South Africa

1940 Cricketer Arthur Morris scores 111 in 2nd innings of 1st game after 148

1944 Former Wash 3rd baseman Buddy Lewis wins Distinguished Flying Cross

1944 Montreal right wing Maurice ‘Rocket’ Richard becomes first player in NHL history to score 8 points in one game with 5 goals and 3 assists in the Canadiens’ 9-1 win over the Detroit Red Wings

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 December 28

Sun Halo over Sweden

Video Credit & Copyright: Håkan Hammar (Vemdalen Ski Resort, SkiStar)

Explanation: What’s happened to the Sun? Sometimes it looks like the Sun is being viewed through a giant lens. In the featured video, however, there are actually millions of tiny lenses: ice crystals. Water may freeze in the atmosphere into small, flat, six-sided, ice crystals. As these crystals flutter to the ground, much time is spent with their faces flat and parallel to the ground. An observer may find themselves in the same plane as many of the falling ice crystals near sunrise or sunset. During this alignment, each crystal can act like a miniature lens, refracting sunlight into our view and creating phenomena like parhelia, the technical term for sundogs. The featured video was taken in late 2017 on the side of a ski hill at the Vemdalen Ski Resort in central Sweden. Visible in the center is the most direct image of the Sun, while two bright sundogs glow prominently from both the left and the right. Also visible is the bright 22 degree halo — as well as the rarer and much fainter 46 degree halo — also created by sunlight refracting through atmospheric ice crystals.