night sky - march 2009

the moon continues to fill up with light over the next few nights as it passes by the constellation, leo. look to the east in the early evening to watch the moon slowly approach saturn. tonight, 8 march, 2009, saturn is at opposition - it sits opposite the sun in our sky, so it's up all night! if you have access to a small telescope (local astronomy clubs, friends, etc...) or binoculars, take a look! saturn's rings are edge-on right now from our perspective on earth, but its a nice treat to see saturn and the moon only 8 degrees apart in the sky... as they will be tuesday night, 10 march, 2009, when the moon is full!!


it makes sense that the full moon appears near saturn in our sky when saturn is at opposition. the moon shines because it reflects sunlight. when the moon is full, sun shine covers the entire surface of the moon that is visible to us. this happens when the earth sits between the sun and the moon so that the sun shining from behind us illuminates the moon.


tuesday night, both saturn and the moon sit exactly opposite of the sun in earths sky!


this image of saturn was taken by the cassini space craft.