celestial calendar

ILLUSTRATION BY JAY RYAN, WWW.SKYWISE.COM

*Instead, the direction of the swirl will be influenced by the shape of the sink, or by subtle currents in the water before the drain is opened.
χ
calendar notes χ1
ψ
–25° SAGITTARIUS
Ceres in the Teapot. During this 200th anniver- σ λ
M28
sary of its discovery (see page 44), minor planet 1
Ceres should be easy to pick up in small tele- φ
June Cer
scopes or good binoculars as it approaches and 1 es τ
then enters the Teapot of Sagittarius. Throughout
June, July, and August it remains brighter than 16 July 1
magnitude 8.5, the cutoff for stars shown on the
chart at right. 16
ζ Aug δ
On its date of opposition to the Sun, July 7th, Nov 1 M54
–30° 16 1
Ceres is as bright as magnitude 7.3. For a few weeks 16 Sept 1
around then, despite bright moonlight, it should M55 Oct 1

PATH DATA: MINOR PLANET CENTER

be visible from anywhere in the world except high 16
northern latitudes where Sagittarius is too low or M69
twilight lasts all night. By September and October, M70
having faded to 9th magnitude, the asteroid loops
back out of the Teapot and heads east.
Ceres is especially easy to identify when it goes ε
near a star, and Belgian astronomer Jean Meeus 19h 40m 19h 20m 19h 00m 18h 40m 18h 20m
predicts several such conjunctions. On the night –35°
of July 7–8 in the Americas, Ceres passes 0.6′
north of 6.2-magnitude SAO 187786 at 5:19 Uni- ter, on October 1st near 7:40 UT, corresponds to Hemisphere, where the radiant climbs to nearly
versal Time (on the 8th). It goes 13′ south of Zeta early evening on the 1st in New Zealand. Ob- overhead around 2 a.m., observers are not likely
(ζ) Sagittarii on the night of July 17–18, then 24′ servers there can spot Ceres, by now magnitude to see more than about 20 Delta Aquarids per
south of the same star on October 9–10. The as- 8.8, some 3.9′ south of the cluster’s center. hour under ideal conditions.
teroid narrowly misses occulting a 6.6-magnitude July meteors. Several weak, long-lasting mete- Asteroid occultation. On Wednesday evening,
star, SAO 211011, when it passes just 0.3′ to its or showers with radiants in the southern sky are July 11th, observers in a path across Texas and
north on October 17th at 15:20 UT. (This event is active from mid-July through August. The best is southern Louisiana might see 702 Alauda blot out
best seen from India or central Russia.) the Delta Aquarid shower, which has two long- an 8.7-magnitude star in Sagittarius. David W.
Twice, Ceres grazes 8th-magnitude globular lasting components. The South Delta Aquarids Dunham’s article on page 116 of the February
cluster M54. Skywatchers in the Middle East and reach maximum around the last week of July, be- issue includes a map of the expected path of visi-
central Asia can see the 7.5-magnitude asteroid fore the Moon reaches first-quarter phase. bility. For an observer centered in the path, the
glide 3.7′ south of the cluster’s center on July 25th Don’t expect many meteors, especially in north- star should vanish for 14 seconds near 10:12 p.m.
near 19:50 UT. The return trip through the clus- ern U.S. and Canada. Even from the Southern Central Daylight Time (3:12 UT on July 12th).

106 July 2001 Sky & Telescope ©2001 Sky Publishing Corp. All rights reserved.
 56
SAGITTARIUS

–20° SAO 188447

a
Alaud 12
13
11
10
9
8
July 7

–21° 19h 44m 19h 40m

The chart above can help you locate the star to be

occulted; it includes stars to magnitude 11 from
the Millennium Star Atlas database.
If the path shifts due to an update in the pre-
diction, the International Occultation Timing As-
sociation will give details a few days beforehand in
a recorded phone message at 301-474-4945. (Also
check the asteroidal section of IOTA’s Web site at
www.lunar-occultations.com/iota.)
Variable-star maxima. July 4, T Cassiopeiae,
001755, 7.9; 4 (primary maximum), R Centauri,
140959, 5.8; 4, T Pavonis, 193972, 8.0; 8, R Canis
Minoris, 070310, 8.0; 13, R Canum Venaticorum,
134440, 7.7; 16, R Aquarii, 233815, 6.5 (see chart,
October 1994, page 75); 16, R Phoenicis, 235150,
8.0; 17, R Hydrae, 132422, 4.5 (see chart, May
1996, page 69); 17, S Herculis, 164715, 7.6; 20, R
Caeli, 043738, 7.9; 20? TT Monocerotis, 072005,
7.3; 21, X Ophiuchi, 183308, 6.8; 24, R Leporis,
045514, 6.8 (see chart, March 1994, page 73); 24,
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T Centauri, 133633, 5.5; 26, RV Centauri, 133155,
7.7; 29, T Columbae, 051533, 7.5.
The data above are, in order: the day of the
month near which the star should be at maxi-
mum brightness; the star’s name; its designation
number, which gives rough equinox-1900.0 right
ascension (first four digits) and declination (bold-
face if southern); and the star’s typical visual mag-
nitude at peak brightness. The actual maximum
may be brighter or fainter and many days early or
late. All predictions are by Janet Mattei using re-
cent data of the American Association of Variable
Star Observers (www.aavso.org).
Minima of Algol. July 2, 11:38; 5, 8:27; 8, 5:15;
11, 2:04; 13, 22:53; 16, 19:41; 19, 16:30; 22, 13:19;
25, 10:07; 28, 6:56; 31, 3:44.
These are the dates and Universal Times when
the eclipsing variable star Algol (β Persei) should
be at its dimmest, magnitude 3.4 instead of its
usual 2.1. It is nearly this faint for two hours, and
it takes several hours to fade and brighten.
Universal Time (UT or UTC) is used worldwide
by astronomers and others to avoid confusion be-
tween time zones. It is expressed in the 24-hour
system, whereby 1:00 p.m. is called 13:00, 2:00
p.m. is 14:00, and so on.
To convert a UT time and date to a standard
time and date in North America, subtract the fol-
lowing hours: to get Eastern Standard Time, 5;
CST, 6; MST, 7; PST, 8; Alaska, 9; or Hawaii, 10. To
obtain daylight saving time (“summer time”), sub-
tract one hour less than these values. If you get a
negative number of hours, add 24; in this case the
result is on the date before the UT date given.
For example, 5:45 UT July 9th is 1:45 a.m. on
the 9th EDT and 10:45 p.m. on the 8th PDT.

©2001 Sky Publishing Corp. All rights reserved. Sky & Telescope July 2001 107