Sky Brims With Wonders

The cool autumn night skies of this month would exclusively enchant avid skygazers with sensational sights of planets, stars, and other celestial entities located all over the heavens. Elusive planet Mercury would be moving across the constellations Scorpius (scorpion) and Ophiuchus (serpent bearer) during daytime and could remain unseen. It could be glimpsed at dusk above the western horizon briefly. It would get to its greatest eastern elongation from the sun on 16 November. Romantic planet Venus could be visible in the southwestern sky at evening twilight. It would be sinking slowly towards the horizon and be evanescent. It would be venturing through the congenial constellations Ophiuchus and sprawling teapot-resembling Sagittarius (archer). 

The red planet Mars could be marvelled at in the eastern sky. It would be climbing the southern sky till morning and fade away above the southwestern horizon at dawn. 

It would be marching mystifyingly across the cute constellation Cancer (crab). Flickering faint stars Asellus Borealis (quaintly 181 light-years away), Asellus Australis (quirkily 140 light-years away), and bewitching broad Beehive clusters (designated M44) could be cherished comfortably to the east of Mars. Beehive cluster (dubbed Praesepe or manger) has been an extraordinary open star cluster accommodating over 1000 red giants and white dwarfs along with main sequence stars that are enigmatically 560 to 610 light-years away. Planet Jupiter and its multiple mesmerising moons would be gracing the eastern sky after sundown. It would be up in the southern sky late at night. It could be discerned in the western sky during sunrise. It would be journeying through the confounding constellation Taurus (bull). It would be skirting superb supernova spectacle alias conspicuous Crab Nebula (M1) startlingly at 6500 light-years away. 

This coruscating cosmic wonder was recorded by Chinese astronomers in 1054. Amazing star Aldebaran (Rohini) at 65 light-years distance would be shimmering shyly below Jupiter. The ringed planet Saturn and its mysterious moons could be savvied serenely in the southeastern sky after sunset. It would be soaring in the southern sky and then shortly settle in the western sky by midnight. It would be mingling with striking stars that sketch the eastern sector of the charming constellation Aquarius (water bearer). Planet Neptune could be resplendently recognised to the northeast of Saturn. The far-flung planet Uranus could be spotted among the stars belonging to the constellation Taurus in the eastern sky after nightfall. It would be ascending the southern sky and be inaccessible at daybreak in the western sky. Jupiter would be featured fascinatingly fulgent to its east. The planet would be in opposition to the sun on November 17 and attempt to embrace the earth. It would be lambent all night long. Due to its staggering span (baffling 2.778 billion kilometres), it would appear aptly as a tiny blue-green dot even through professional telescopes. The blue-hued planet Neptune could be perceived proficiently under the commanding circlet asterism of the comely V-mimicking constellation Pisces (fish) in the southeastern sky after nightbreak. It would be gliding high in the southern sky, and by midnight it would be unnoticeable in the western sky. 

The new moon would befall on November 1. The full moon would be on November 15. It would bear its popular moniker of the beaver full moon because during the time of the year, hunters would traditionally set the beaver traps before the swamps and rivers would freeze. It would represent the last of the three supermoons for 2024. The moon would drift closest to earth at sheer 361.867 thousand kilometres and look slightly bigger (paltry 14 percent) and more dazzling (pleasantly 30 percent) than usual. Bhai Tika and Chat festivals are respectfully celebrated on 03 and 07 November. 

A long-running minor Taurid meteor shower releasing scant 5-10 meteors per hour would unusually consist of two separate streams seemingly springing out from the vicinity of star Aldebaran and from the petit, misty, odd open star cluster Pleiades (seven sisters), which are perplexing 444 light-years away. Constellation: Taurus would crawl high in the sky during the wee hours of the night and offer good time around midnight for watching Taurids. 

The first one (North Taurids) ostensibly originates from the grain remnants from eccentrically arcane and potentially hazardous asteroid 2004 TG10 that would revolve around the Sun once every 3 years and 4 months. However, the South Taurids are putatively produced by debris left behind by the periodic comet 2P/Encke, with its trajectory around the Sun counting to 3.3 years, which was computed by German astronomer Johann Franz Encke in 1819. 

The South Taurids climax could be enjoyed on the night of November 5 without the interference of the moon, but on November 12, the show of North Taurids during its peak would be disturbed by the waxing crescent moon. South Taurids would run from merely 23 September to 12 November. North Taurids are active basically from 13 October to 02 December. An alluring average Leonid meteor shower would display dramatically up to 15 meteors per hour at its crescendo moment, which would occur during the night of November 17 in the eastern sky until the morning of November 18 this year. 

This shower has been deemed unique because of its cyclonic maximum recurring roughly every 33 years (coinciding with the orbital period of the parent comet), where hundreds of meteors per hour could be witnessed alike in 1966 and 2001. 

The Leonids have emerged from dust particles left behind by comet 55P/Tempel-Tuttle, which was identified by German and American astronomers Wilhelm Tempel and Horace Tuttle in 1865/66. 

The shower would be alive annually from 06 to 30 November. Unfortunately, the waning gibbous nearly full moon would block all but the brightest shooting stars. Patient meteor shower-fan could still relish a few shiny ones from dark venues. Meteors would eerily exude from the radiant point dwelling adjacent to the bewildering binary star Algieba, which together with a triad of other scintillating stars concoct the imaginary backward question mark or sickle-shaped asterism (depicting the mane and head of a lion) in the constellation Leo (lion). It would be fairly 130 light-years away.

 Star Regulus (Magha) would be applauded as queer quadruple star arrangement below Algieba. It would be simply 79 light-years away. NASA’s probe Europa Clipper has been dispatched from Kennedy Space Centre, Florida, towards Jupiter’s icy moon Europa to investigate if it would be holding crucial components for supporting life. 

It was sent off aboard SpaceX's powerful Falcon Heavy rocket and would be reaching Europa in five and a half years. It would allow the experts to divulge new details about Europa, which could carry ocean beneath its ice-covered surface. The mission would delve deep into the structure and composition of Europa, its depth, and the salinity of its ocean and ferret out if water has been leaking to its surface. It would aim to understand whether the three ingredients—water, energy, and certain chemical compounds inevitable for life—are present there. If these conditions prevailed on Europa, life could be extant in the ocean, possibly in the form of primitive bacteria. The craft would be travelling over 2.9 billion kilometres during its trek and arrive at Europa in April 2030. Its operation would persist for another four years. Circa four thousand people had worked tentatively on this USD 5.2 billion assignment for one decade. 

The investment would be justified by the important findings from collected data that could perhaps prove if our Solar System would be home to two habitable worlds in Europa and Earth. The Europa Clipper would be conducting its job at the same time as the European Space Agency's (ESA) Jupiter’s Icy Moons Explorer (JUICE) spacecraft would be studying Europa and two other moons of Jupiter, namely Ganymede and Callisto. JUICE was successfully launched in April 2023 from Europe's Spaceport in Kourou, French Guiana. It would be greeting Jupiter in approximately eight years, in December 2031. 

Jupiter boasts laudably 95 moons (the second largest number of moons after Saturn with a whopping 146). Four of Jupiter's moons, Io, Europa, Ganymede, and Callisto, are awesomely known as the Galilean moons. They were the first Elysian objects to be ascertained, remarkably rushing around bizarre bodies other than the sun or earth, when iconic Italian astronomer Galileo Galilei first observed them historically with his telescope in 1610.

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