Celestial Miracles Grace August

The clear, chilly night skies of this month would dramatically display plentiful planets, stars, and copious celestial entities that would be sprawling all over the heavens. Planet Mercury would stay out of sight. It would be lost in solar glare.  It would be fleeting through the confounding constellations Leo (lion) and Virgo (maiden).  Planet Venus could be admired in the western sky succinctly after sundown; it would be cavorting comfortably with the stars that sketch constellation Leo. The resplendent star Regulus (Magha) would be sparkling below Venus. Regulus (translated to little king in Latin) would appear singular, but it has been queer quadruple star system composed of four stars that have been organised into two pairs. 

The spectroscopic binary Regulus A would consist of a single blue-white main-sequence star, and its companion could be a white dwarf. They would be barely 79 light years from the sun. Regulus, along with five stygian stars, have collectively been designated as the sickle or reversed question mark asterism that meaningfully portrays the head of the legendary lion. The red planet Mars could be marvelled at in the eastern sky prior to sunrise. It would be marching above the eastern horizon after mid-night and mingling with the stunning stars that make up the captivating constellation Taurus (bull). Alluring red giant star Aldebaran (Rohini) could be astounded below Mars. It would be putatively 65 light-years away and palpably evident as the follower in Arabic language.

Planet Jupiter and its mystifying moons could be perceived peacefully in the eastern sky late in the night till early morning before sunrise. It would be gambolling with the glistening stars of the constellation Taurus. The current study could bestow a logical explanation to why Jupiter's Great Red Spot has been shrinking. This immense windstorm has been a red-orange oval of high pressure, where the anticyclone would swirl anticlockwise with persisting winds exceeding 432 kilometres per hour. The precise time of its formation, rational reasons behind its creation, and distinct red-orange colour are unknown. 

The ringed planet Saturn could be savoured in the eastern sky after sundown. It would be climbing the southern sky and then be gliding towards the south-western sky and be evanescent as the dawn would break. 

It could be located in the eastern section of the arcane constellation Aquarius (water bearer). The far-flung planet Uranus could be discerned late at night till before day-begin in the eastern sky. It would be detected in the constellation Taurus; planets Mars and Jupiter would be coruscating on its eastern side. 

The far-away planet Neptune could be glanced at in the eastern sky late at night. It could be pursued as a fulgent dot of light in the southern sky. By shimmering morning twilight, it would be above the southwest horizon. It would be viewed below the commanding circlet-asterism of the V-mimicking constellation Pisces (fishes). Planet Saturn would be scintillating to its west. 

The new moon would befall on 4 August. The full moon (venerated Janai Purnima) would betide on 19 August. Its famed popular moniker would be sturgeon full moon, because the large sturgeon fish of the major lakes could be easily caught at this time of year. Gai Jatra would be merrily observed on 30 August. Krishna Asthami would be respectfully celebrated on 26 August. 

Naag Panchami festival would joyfully be extolled on 09 August. The full moon in August 2024 would be reckoned as extra special because it would be the first supermoon of the year and seasonal blue moon. It would be residing in the amazing constellation Aquarius. The blue moon has either been recognised as the third of four full moons in an astronomical season or the second full moon in a calendar month. In 2024, four full moons transpire in one season between the June solstice and the September equinox, and the August full moon would be the third one of them. 

The median span between the moon and our planet would be simply 384.400 kilometers. The full moons that come closest to the earth are called supermoons. Thus, a supermoon would be a full or new moon at or near (within ninety percent) during the immediate approach to earth. Super full moons loom merely seven percent bigger and fairly sixteen percent more fulgurating than the ordinary ones. The moon, even when not necessarily full, could sometimes look blue due to atmospheric emissions from forest fires or volcano eruptions, though the phenomenon would be rare and unpredictable (hence the saying once in a blue moon). Calendar blue moon would be relatively common, happening utterly seven times in every nineteen years (once every two or three years). 

Blue moons would be manifested due to the time between successive full moons (approximately 29.5 days), which would be obviously shorter than the average month.

The perplexingly prolific Perseid meteor shower would be exhibiting up to sixty meteors per hour at its peak this year, 2024, in the eastern sky from the night of 11 August till the morning of 12 August. The first quarter moon would perhaps block out some of the fainter meteors in the evening, but as the moon would set after midnight and leave tenebrous skies for offering excellent early morning show. 

Meteors would emanate from the radiant point standing in the peculiar constellation Perseus (mythological hero) spotted near the famous Double Cluster comprising of two open clusters, NGC869 and NGC844, with over 300 supergiant stars each. They are apparently 6800 and 7600 light-years away, respectively. 

The parent comet responsible for the Perseid meteor shower has been rather colossal comet 109P/Swift-Tuttle. The comet would orbit the Sun assuredly every 133 years. American astronomers Lewis Swift and Horace Tuttle had visually identified it in 1862. The shower would run annually from 17 July to 24 August. Shooting stars are explicitly lucent whenever comet debris collides with earth's atmosphere and incinerates at altitudes of 70 to 100 kilometers. 

The enigmatic eclipsing binary star Algol, meaning demon’s head or literally the ghoul in Arabic, could be wowed in Perseus. Its variable effulgence has been associated with a winking eye that would brighten and dim with clockwork regularity. Algol would be circa 84 light-years away.

Experts have recently confirmed that the rotation of the earth's inner core has seemingly slowed down in several decades. This could alter the length of our days slightly by a few fractions of a second. However, we would not need to reset your watches yet. Earth’s inner core has been deemed as a super-hot, super-dense ball of iron and nickel that is thought to be scant two-thirds the size of the moon and has been found credibly over 4800 kilometers below the earth's surface. 

Furthermore, climate change has been probably causing days to get longer by slowing down the earth. Rising temperatures have been influencing our planet through changing weather patterns, animal migrations, and plant flowering. As polar ice melt, more water would circulate over oceans (analogous to ice skaters spreading their arms out), and earth would be slowing down. Earth, as a gigantic globe, has not actually been a perfect sphere. Instead, it has been more properly referred to as an oblate spheroid that has been squashed from top to bottom and bulging out at the equator. More significant impacts are spawned by the sun and moon, as their gravity would warp earth. Their pull on the oceans would trigger processes known as tidal friction, which would deplorably decelerate our planet. 

Our timing was tied directly to the whirling of the earth. Second was defined by dividing the time it took for earth to twirl by the number of seconds in one day, which have been specifically 86400. However, with the development of atomic clocks, the second was based on the state of caesium atoms. These clocks have been extremely stable, losing just one second over ten million years. Although the implications of our planet's spin and increasing wobble show how widespread repercussions on earth could be, they are by no means dangerously damaging to us yet. 

Although there is no indication of any kind of apocalyptic disaster as presented in sci-fi movies, we could presumably experience slender shifts in the duration of days and nights.

(Dr. Shah is an academician at NAST and patron of NASO.)