Czerwona zorza nad Włochami

2023-11-06 Giorgia Hofer

What was that red glow on the horizon last night? Aurora. Our unusually active Sun produced a surface explosion a few days ago that sent out a burst of electrons, protons, and more massive charged nuclei. This coronal mass ejection (CME) ...

Zorza polarna nad Norwegią

2023-11-05 Ole C. Salomonsen (Arctic Light Photo)

It was Halloween and the sky looked like a creature. Exactly which creature, the astrophotographer was unsure (but possibly you can suggest one). Exactly what caused this eerie apparition in 2013 was sure: one of the best auroral displays that ...

Dinkinesh Moonrise

2023-11-04

Last Wednesday the voyaging Lucy spacecraft encountered its first asteroid, 152830 Dinkinesh, and discovered the inner-main belt asteroid has a moon. From a distance of just over 400 kilometers, Lucy's Long-Range Reconnaissance Imager ...

Jowisz w świetle księżyca

2023-11-03 Giorgia Hofer

That bright beacon you've seen rising in the east just after sunset is Jupiter. Climbing high in midnight skies, our Solar System's ruling gas giant was at its 2023 opposition, opposite the Sun in planet Earth's sky, on November 2. ...

Gromada galaktyk Fornax

2023-11-02 Marcelo Rivera

Named for the southern constellation toward which most of its galaxies can be found, the Fornax Cluster is one of the closest clusters of galaxies. About 62 million light-years away, it's over 20 times more distant than our neighboring ...

Roczne zaćmienie Słońca nad Utah

2023-11-01 MaryBeth Kiczenski

Part of the Sun disappeared earlier this month, but few people were worried. The missing part, which included the center from some locations, just went behind the Moon in what is known as an annular solar eclipse. Featured here is an eclipse ...

Halloween i Mgławica Czarnoksiężnika

2023-10-31 Richard McInnis

Halloween's origin is ancient and astronomical. Since the fifth century BC, Halloween has been celebrated as a cross-quarter day, a day halfway between an equinox (equal day / equal night) and a solstice (minimum day / maximum night in the ...

Odbicia Mgławicy Duch

2023-10-30 Bogdan Jarzyna

Do any shapes seem to jump out at you from this interstellar field of stars and dust? The jeweled expanse, filled with faint, starlight-reflecting clouds, drifts through the night in the royal constellation of Cepheus. Far from your own ...

Częściowe zaćmienie Księżyca

2023-10-29 Orazio Mezzio

What's happened to the Moon? Within the last day, part of the Moon moved through the Earth's shadow. This happens about once or twice a year, but not every month since the Moon's orbit around the Earth is slightly tilted. ...

Duchy Gamma Cas

2023-10-28 Guillaume Gruntz

Gamma Cassiopeiae shines high in northern autumn evening skies. It's the brightest spiky star in this telescopic field of view toward the constellation Cassiopeia. Gamma Cas shares the ethereal-looking scene with ghostly interstellar clouds ...