Vega, the brightest member of the Summer Triangle, is high in the east at nightfall early in the month and directly overhead by month’s end. By then, Pegasus is in view low in the east, marked by the Great Square. Arcturus, one of the other brilliant stars of summer, is plunging toward the western horizon as August wanes.
The full Moon of August is known as the Grain Moon or Green Corn Moon
Perigee August 10
Apogee August 22
Moon phases are Central Time.
Lambda Draconis, the star at the end of the tail of Draco, the dragon, is puffing up. It is about 70 times wider than the Sun and almost 900 times brighter. The star is low in the north at nightfall, with the rest of the dragon stretching to its left.
A supermoon is coming on Sunday night. The Moon will be full only half a day before it reaches its closest point to Earth, so it will look a bit bigger and brighter than average. It coincides with a total lunar eclipse, as the Moon passes through Earth’s shadow.
Aldebaran, the star that represents the eye of Taurus, the bull, stands close to the upper right of the Moon this evening. Aldebaran is nearing the end of its life, so it has puffed up to several dozen times the diameter of the Sun.
The Moon has a bright companion tonight. Aldebaran, the brightest star of Taurus, is to the lower left of the Moon at nightfall. The star’s orange color may be a bit difficult to perceive through the moonlight.
The brilliant planets Venus and Jupiter team up with the star Antares in the southeast the next few days to form a beautiful triangle at dawn. Venus is the brightest of the three. Jupiter stands to its lower left, with Antares to the right of Jupiter.
The Moon is at first quarter today, as sunlight illuminates half of the lunar hemisphere that faces Earth. It will rise in early evening and stand high in the southeast at nightfall.
Orion is in the east in early evening, with its “belt” of three bright stars pointing up from the horizon. Orion’s brightest star, blue-white Rigel, is to the right of the Belt. The bright star above Rigel is Cursa, which represents a footstool for the hunter.
The planet Mars perches close to the upper right of the Moon at nightfall. Although it has lost much of the brilliance it displayed last summer, Mars still looks like a fairly bright orange star.
Rigel, one of the feet of Orion, the hunter, stands to the right of Orion’s three-star belt in early evening. It is one of the biggest, brightest stars in the galaxy. Over the next few million years it is likely to puff up even more, then end its life as a supernova.
Orion may be the most impressive of all the constellations. It consists of a bright rectangle of stars with a “belt” of three stars in the middle, and a massive stellar nursery along the hunter’s sword.
