Quote:
Originally Posted by Hemi
Hi Dart,
Welcome, as Paul has said, any celestial object west of south is on its way down, so a star almost at the horizon at 8pm won’t be higher in the west at 1am.
It can’t be Sirius, from your location description and essentially rises and sets in the daytime this time of year. It looks like a pin point star in most telescopes, so won’t appear squashed to the naked eye because of its tiny companion.
It can’t be Canopus, as it has set by 9pm, it’s interesting though as you can see it again same night, as it rises at 3am but in the SE. again wrong time and location from your description.
Are you continually observing from 8pm to 1am? If not then I suspect you maybe looking at two different objects that you think are the same. It’s very easy to do, if your not familiar with the night sky and how it works. If the sky is not great for seeing, then the stars will twinkle away in all manner of shapes and colours.
Pity about the smart phone, as it will answer your question, maybe you could borrow one. You could try to print out a star chart from the internet.
Happy investigating.
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Appreciate the comprehensive answer Hemi; very interesting about the other stars mentioned as well as what you and Bluester said about that it could not rise if it was in that start position. I will just have to keep looking and keep making a note of times and positions etc. I have only really observed it about four times (not all in a row) so I suppose in this type of scientific field, that's not enough to make definite conclusions. So it is possible it could even be a planet. Tonight was a almost a full moon so too much light to view it as before.
Yes I only see the night sky in that time range.
To my amateur eyes, it is so distinctive in its shape and colours and brightness that I am pretty sure if I had an astronomer from Perth standing next to me and I pointed it out, he (or she) would say, "oh, that's such & such!"
Just seeing the bright points of red and green coming from it occasionally is quite amazing.
I will keep watching and noting!
Thanks.