Jupiter and Mars Conjunction on Sunday Morning

[glend]

This seems to be a pretty spectactular meeting of these two planets. You will need to be outside at 4:30am looking east at around 30 degrees altitude. They will be separated by about 0.2 degrees and may easily be observed in a telescope field of view. Worth getting up for imho. For the planetary imaging guys, maybe it will still be dark enough then to grab a video file, worth a try.

This is the beginning of the 2018 planetary season, as they are finally getting into position for us to appreciate them again.:eyepop:

[bigjoe]

Glen ..This looks like a cracker of a year to observe and image all the planets.
Even Mars and Saturn will be within 1°16' of each other on 2nd April 2018 , 22.44 AEST ; both at Mag 0.3...Get those wide fields ready.
bigjoe

[mozzie]

Thanks for the reminder..
Weather looking good this weekend fingers crossed

Mozzie

[Saturnine]

The weather forecast for Sunday morning is favourable, so far, for the Sydney, Wollongong , Newcastle areas with a calm patch of jetstream above as well. Will definitely be out observing and imaging the conjunction.
Being able to get 2 bright planets in one medium power field is something I've never seen before, pity Mars wasn't closer to opposition and a bit bigger than 7" dia. so that some detail could be seen at the same time as Jupiters main belts and moons.

[skysurfer]

The closest approach is indeed 4:30 but it is UTC which is shortly after noon in Australia. But any decent telescope will show Mars on the daylight sky with the help of the much brighter Jupiter.

See Stellarium picture (from central NSW at 01:00 UTC == 12:00 AEDT). Closest approach.

[glend]

Sky Safari shows the pair at 30 degress altitude at 90 degrees East at 4:35am AEDT, and obviously it is visible prior to that below 30 degrees altitude. The Moon is over by the northern Meridian at that time. Splitting hairs over the UTC closest approach, after daylight, is irrelevant to most Australian observers, which is why the information was posted as written. Closest spproach is a misnomer in any case, as it is apparent separation at this angle as viewed from Earth. If your in Australia and go outside between 4 and 4:30am AEDT on Sunday morning you won't be able to miss it, whether using your naked eye, binos, or your other gear.

[mozzie]

Went for a peek at Jupiter this morning and as usual light cloud typical this time of year..

[Tropo-Bob]

Likewise for me, except it was heavy cloud. I won't give up trying though!

[mozzie]

Bob
I had just purchased 2 new eyepieces and wanted to have a peek last night before the moon rise..
Absolute perfect day come 8ish not one star to be seen all night..
6.30 this morning cloud gone another ripper off s day..
I bet I know what tonight will do again :sadeyes::mad2::rofl:

[bigjoe]

[QUOTE=Tropo-Bob;1350984]Likewise for me, except it was heavy cloud. I won't give up trying though![/QUOTE

Same here Bob ..Attacked by blood sucking Mozzies , whilst looking for sucker holes all night long..have not been able to finish some double star obs with 9 mag plus secondaries from the city, as a test to how faint I can go on them with some Moon and average seeing.
bigjoe.

[Startrek]

Hi All,

I have been observing Jupiter and Mars at 4.00am the last 2 mornings from my holiday house 220km south of Sydney.
As they are sitting around 25 to 30 deg there is a bit of turbulence etc as I am sitting only 50m above sea level but views still good. Cloud bands very defined on Jupiter and 4 moons all lined up on axis. Mars ok but not defined

Can’t wait for Sunday morning

Using my 10” dob with 6mm Delos and #80A med blue filter

Martin

[astro744]

I've been observing this past week both Mars and Jupiter as they dance around Zubenelgenubi, the star with the best name of all.

This morning I used my Tele Vue-60 and 6-3mm Nagler zoom and 2.5mm Nagler with and without Tele Vue Bandmate Planetary filter. At the 6mm setting both planets were on the edge of the same field of view, this at 60x. At 120x and 144x I could see the GRS on Jupiter along with numerous bands. The contrast on this little 'scope is astounding!

Mars was clearly a disk but bland even though seeing wasn't too bad given the altitude. I've seen Syrtis Major (as an obvious dark patch) with this little telescope when Mars was around 5 arc seconds when it was in the evening sky a few months ago at a similar altitude. I checked the ephemeris later and found Syrtis Major was around the other side at the time.

I'm looking forward to the opposition of Mars this year which will see Mars appear about 5x larger than currently at 24.3 arc seconds on July 27.

[skysurfer]

Saturday morning in EU (18:30 AEDT) I saw both planets rather close in morning twilight with my 80mm tabletop scope + Nagler 13T6.

I found Alpha Librae a few degrees west of them.

Tomorrow morning they are even closer, I hope it is clear then.

[bigjoe]

Im hoping the same Skysurfer ..will be up early with the refractor 24 Pan and. 11mm Nagler at f5..what a sight its going to be.and Yes Zubenelgenubi( very wide double is nearby)..lovely colours even in Binos.
bigjoe.

[glend]

Wonderful vews of the conjunction just now. I was able to get both Mars and Jupiter in the field of view of my 15mm Superview EP on my Edge HD8 scope (@ 2032mm fl).

Banding on Jupiter stood out well and I was treated to the additional conjunction of Europa and Io, nearest to Jupiter, passing within a hairs width of each other but with a clear gap.
Glad i took the trouble to look.

Mars was not great in detail, being so far away from Earth right now, but had good ol Mars colour but suffered from a little from Seeing conditions at that altitude.

[skysurfer]

It is even possible to see them by daylight, closest approach occurs in daylight in Australia, but, even for a small telescope this is no problem. Jupiter is easy to find and is a 'guide' to find Mars.

[LostInSp_ce]

Sounds like it's quite a view Glen. Too many clouds here but I'll try again later in hope of a lucky break. I'm really looking forward to imaging 'The Mars show' later on in the year.

[Tropo-Bob]

WOW! These are really close. Its like a visual double, a bright white and a lesser red.

Using a 120x ortho EP, I can comfortable fit both in the same field of view.

All Jupiter's Moons are strung out to one side, and Mars is roughly perpendicular to them, but only a about 2.5 times the visual distance as from Jupiter to outermost Callisto. Very impressive.

Although Mars is the less bright of the two, when I view it through the scope, it can be seen that it is brighter per unit of its surface area. There is just so much less of it.

No detail seen on Mars at 120x. Conditions are only fair. There is the largest ring around the Moon that I have ever noticed; over 20 degrees in radius. So more rain is probably on the way.

[Wavytone]

Hmm cloud here :( too humid I guess. Probably should have gone up the mountains.

[Startrek]

Observed this morning at 4.00am however seeing conditions were average, yesterday morning at same time was much better, could see defined cloud bands and moons were sharp

Still a great event to get both planets in your field of view

Martin

[Tinderboxsky]

Bob, your comments captured my impressions too. Europa and Io were in very close conjunction which added to the scene as Glen noted.
We had clear skies here at 4.00am and I started observing with my 85mm Ziess spotting scope at 25X which allowed me to capture Mars, Jupiter and the wide pair Zubenelgenubi in the same FOV, along with a sprinkling of other field stars. It was a magnificent field.
I then swapped to my ED103S on a goto mount as I want to track the progress during the day. I found my Panoptic 24 giving 33X the best option as seeing here is just average.
At 5.30am, 10 minutes before sunrise, Jupiter’s disc had faded to a faint yellow with the main bands still very visible and the four moons starting to fade from view. Mars was a pretty bright pink. Mars was still almost vertically above Jupiter but had got noticeably closer to Jupiter.
At 8.30am, Jupiter was pale white against the blue sky with the main bands still visible. Mars was a bright pink. By now, the orientation of the two planets had clearly changed, reflecting the Earth’s rotation sweeping the two across the sky. Keeping Jupiter in the centre of the FOV Mars has clearly rotated clockwise. Note, my scope is showing a horizontal mirror reversed image.
At 9.30am, the pair are very close to culmination. Mars is now at about the 1.30 clock-face position relative to Jupiter.
I think closest approach is at about 11.25am, so Ill have another look then. I’ll visit Mercury and Saturn and view bright double stars in the meantime.

[Tropo-Bob]

Steve, I like your remarks about Mars appearing pink. I followed Mars for about 30 mins after sunrise and was surprised how pink (rather than red) it appeared.

And that ring around the Moon I mentioned . . . it is now raining.

[gjr80]

Hopefully an omen for the future, left my 4.5" newt setup after doing some observing last night before moonrise. When I got up just on 3:00am to view Jupiter and Mars they were nicely placed in a notch between 2 large gum trees. Usually I find things go the other way, whatever I want to see is usually hiding behind a tree, the problem of having large trees on 2.5 sides.

As for Jupiter and Mars, was great to be able to see both and Jupiters moons in the same field of view. At first I was wondering what happened to one of the moons as I could only see 3, a little better focussing and 3 became 4. The problems with having a dicky focusser.

My first time observing an event since resurrecting my scope late last year. Looking forward to 31 January and getting a better scope later this year.

Gary

[mozzie]

Was delighted to awake to clear skies...
Very easily placed Jupiter and mars in the eyepiece with a nice placement of the moons as earlier posts stated..
Some trouble with getting the planets crisp in the eyepiece as the summer soupie atmosphere and living next to the ocean plays havoc some days..
Best seeing was after sunrise and so happy to have viewed this..

Come on lunar eclipse.....
And hopefully a clear night fingers crossed

Mozzie

[Tinderboxsky]

To follow on from my earlier post: I took another look at 11.25am in bright sunshine - not a cloud in the sky.
Both Jupiter and Mars appeared fainter. Mars was quite difficult to see initially, even though I knew where to look. Once I found Mars it was easy enough to keep it in view. Mars was still a faint pink and Jupiter a washed out white. The bands on Jupiter we're only just visible, so perhaps the hot, higher Sun is now causing a lot more turbulence that is not obvious at 33X.
Mars was now positioned at 2.00 on a clock face with Jupiter at the centre. I could not see any change in angular separation from my earlier observation at 9.30. I would have needed a micrometer equiped eyepiece to see the small change. I think the two will now slowly separate.

I visited Mercury whilst waiting. Best view was at 62x. Mercury was a small, moderately bright shimmering irregularly shaped disk, reflecting it's current phase. I tried for Saturn, but to no avail - it was washed out by the Sun's glare despite some extra long shielding to keep stray light out.
I then visited Rigel Kent - bright white with a hint of blue. Best view was at 62x. Whilst a lot of turbulence, the pair were easily split in regular moments of better seeing. I had planned to visit Acrux next but I had left it too late as it was now just below my roof line. I had set the scope up close to the house to get some shielding from some occasional gusts of wind.
I visited Antares to finish up. I was a beautiful yellow-orange speck against the blue sky.

[bigjoe]

This was the impression I got too Bob; like a giant double double with Zubenelgenubi, in the binos or 24Pan in the Refractor, with Jupiters moons to one side in my 10.5 x45 ED Binos... and a rather pinky looking Mars hardly any detail in the scope except on Jove, as I stayed Up till 330 am, it was only very low over the City skyline with Jupiter just below..an impressive sight !
bigjoe

[bigjoe]

A rare sight for us indeed Steve .

Stayed up for this, and earlier had easily split Theta Indi ..one of my personal favorites.

Jupiter and Mars together did look like a lovely wide double double in Binos , with the very wide Zubenelgenubi some degrees above and to left in Sydney...Mars pink, and no detail , soo low over Sydney at 330am... Jupiter the usual bands a yellow white ,with Moons to side in Binos and scope

Watched a bit more got inspired went over to Upsilon Carinae mags 3,6 sep 5.0"...that looks a bit like the brighter Rigel double ..very pretty, as is the wonderful Gamma Volantis nearby ..then slept...Not much cloud and an event to remember.
Thanks for your report.
bigjoe.

[Dennis]

I was hoping that the tightly spaced Jupiter/Mars pair would clear the trees before the dawn sky brightened too much – the trees blocking my Eastern Horizon had grown considerably in the last 12 months.:(

Tantalising glimpses of Jupiter and the 4 Galilean Moons materialised on the LCD on the back of the camera as the topmost branches swayed in the light breeze when finally, Jupiter and Mars cleared the top of the trees and I could get to work recording this close conjunction.:)

I took several frames at varying ISO speeds (ISO100 to ISO3200) and shutter speeds (1/8 sec to 30 secs) so I could later select frames that showed the field stars (Jupiter and Mars grossly over exposed) and the disc of Jupiter with the equatorial bands.

A little bit of Photoshop magic allowed me to combine the sets and produce this composite.:)

Cheers

Dennis

[bigjoe]

Nice images Dennis..one certainly can see how far away Callisto (Mag 5.6 at opposition), is visually from Jupiter in the sky ; Mars just over a degree gives one an indication.
bigjoe.

[Dennis]

Thanks Joe, I appreciate your comments.:)

When I measured the separation between Jupiter and Mars in SkyTools 3 Pro, the program measured it at some 14 arc mins, less than ½ diameter of the full Moon.:)

Cheers

Dennis

[LostInSp_ce]

Beautiful images thanks for sharing. :thumbsup:

[Dennis]

I also took some images of our Moon just before Jupiter and Mars cleared the tree line, using the same equipment set up and configuration, so I overlaid the Jupiter/Moon image over a Moon image to show just how close the 2 planets were.:)

Cheers

Dennis

[Tropo-Bob]

Nice work Dennis. Thanks for posting these.

[bigjoe]

[QUOTE=Dennis;1351283]Thanks Joe, I appreciate your comments.:)

When I measured the separation between Jupiter and Mars in SkyTools 3 Pro, the program measured it at some 14 arc mins, less than ½ diameter of the full Moon.:)

Cheers

Dennis[/QUOTE
Now thats actually closer than I expected..Thanks for the info.
bigjoe.

[skysurfer]

I saw both of them this morning (in EU, 18:30 AEDT), like yesterday, with my 80mm tabletop scope in the twilight on a cold winter morning with barely above freezing temps. Hard to imagine with 40+ temps in western NSW / Vic....

I took a video with the Canon Powershot S100 behind the 22mm Plössl and the 13T6 Nagler, and selected the best frames from it.
The moons were easily visible, but not on the photo.
Even with the TMB Planetary 4mm (130x) they both fitted in the FOV, but the seeing was horrible.

After two years (of 21 Dec 2020) there will be a VERY close (and so close once-in-a-lifetime) Jupiter-Saturn conjuntion, only 6' apart. Both move slowly, so there is a larger time window (even days) to see the close conjuction.

@Tinderboxsky: Nice daylight observations, you saw the +1.4 Mars with the Sun high in the sky ? Great ! Your ED103 is very similar to my ED110, which I also use for daylight views. And it amazed me that you saw Alpha Centauri 'bluish'. I see that star in daylight white with a slight yellow tinge as a contrast to the blue sky, like Capella which is also a G star. But the Sun is also a G star and (when high in the sky) it is not yellow at all, but that is because of the much brighter nature.
An F star like Canopus I indeed see white with a bluish tinge in the daytime.

[bigjoe]

Poo

That Saturn /Jupiter conjunction not far off will be one of the visual and imaging astro feasts of the century..Imagine the view at ultra high power of both , and in the same field..priceless!

PS:Imagine showing this to people at Outreach events!

bigjoe.

[Saturnine]

Had a look at the conjunction this morning, clear skies all night but the seeing was terrible. Could barely make out Jupiters main cloud bands at 140X in the 127mm f7 but seeing Jupiter, its moons and Mars in the one field of view at , just, at 237X with an WO 4mm UW eyepiece was something that wont be seen again by my eyes.
Did take some avis' too that I will get around to processing soon, I hope. May have been better off using a dslr as Dennis' images are what I'm hoping mine may approach in detail and quality.
Looking forward to Mars and Saturn in early April when Mars is larger, 8" - 9" but just over 1 deg. apart and on Dec. 22nd Jupiter and Mercury ( 8" ) will be only 0.8 deg. apart , low in the eastern morning sky.
The 2020 Jupiter / Saturn conjunction is really something to look forward to, gives me a few years to hone my imaging skills, as that will be spectacular. Any bets on a cyclone on the east coast the week before xmas 2020.

[bigjoe]

Cyclone Jeff .. ha... who knows ..very poor seeing lately in Sydney.
Mars and Saturn will be a cracker also in April..and I too will want to image them, and they'll be around some stunning doubles also, as well as very close to stunning M22 April 1st.
Imagine that also; Mars and M22 only 21 minutes of arc separating them!
bigjoe.

[Tropo-Bob]

Mars is still close to Jupiter this morning. The gap between the two appears to be about 40 to 50% wider than yesterday. However, I can still, just fit them into the same field of view at 120x using an otho EP. My guess is that they are a little bit over of a third of a degree apart.

Mars has moved from yesterday being above (to the west) of Jupiter to today being along side (to the south-east),

[Tropo-Bob]

I had a quick look this morning. The planets were about 0.5 to 0.6 degrees apart, which is still impressive, but pales in comparison with the previous 2 mornings.

[Saturnine]

Completely clouded out down here the last 2 mornings and more forecast, would have enjoyed watching the pair slowly seperate. There are more conjunctions over the next few months and years to look forward to thankfully.

[glend]

Yes i agree, this one is over, and this thread has served it's purpose. Thanks to all that have contributed.