Where’s the Milky Way?

Welcome to summer! No one wants to go outside during the daylight hours, except maybe to hit the water, but even then, the Sun is brutal. Slather on that sunscreen.

Our summer nights are a little better, so let’s check out stuff to check out well after sunset.

The southern sky is summer’s circus midway, with attractions from Virgo in the southwest to Aquarius in the southeast. But the big tent attractions are Scorpius and Sagittarius, smack in the southern sky’s Milky Way. Can’t see the Milky Way where you live? That’s the case for most people now, and it’s preventable, maybe reversable. For now, turn off your house lights, inside and out, find a spot looking south. Maybe it’s on the side of your house or garage, or other building that is protected from glare.  I have included a screen shot from the planetarium software named Stellarium for reference. Stellarium is a free application so get a copy for yourself to use.

Maybe you can’t pick out the Milky Way, but it’s there and even with light pollution once you know where to look, you can make out its ghostly, nebulous shape. With binoculars it will emerge from light pollution. The first step is to know where to look.

Looking at the Stellarium image try to make out the shapes of Scorpius and Sagittarius. Scorpius definitely has a scorpion appearance with its three-star head at upper right, Antares is its heart, and below is its curled tail with a stinger. The best we can do with Sagittarius (the archer) is visualize its “teapot” asterism (stars making a recognizable pattern, but it’s not a constellation – think Big Dipper).  Look at the image, see if you can make out the teapot shape, with its spout pointed a little to the upper right, its triangular lid, and its pot below.  The Milky Way runs smack through Sagittarius, even catching a bit of Scorpius. On a clear, moon-free night go out and try to spot the Milky Way.

If you have them, and I hope you do, with binoculars, slowly scan from Scorpius through Sagittarius and note the number of stars you can see and how they are concentrated in various ways. You are gazing toward the heart of our Milky Way, the concentrations of stars being parts of vast spiral arms. Our Milky Way is what’s termed a barred spiral galaxy. The bar appears from concentrations of stars toward the center that have been shaped by gravity and the Milky Way’s rotation.

With binoculars again, focus on the teapot and above its lid. There are loads of star clusters and nebulae packed into this area.

What’s in the Sky?

July 10; 45 minutes after sunset; west: Venus, Mars, and Leo’s alpha star Regulus are grouped in the western sky.

July 12-13; before sunrise; east: A waning crescent Moon parties with Jupiter, Uranus, and the Pleiades star cluster. Binoculars help. You will need binoculars to see Uranus below and left of the Moon on the 12th.