Three bright planets stairstep up the evening sky for most of the month. Venus, the Evening Star, is the brightest, followed by Jupiter, then Mercury (see Featured Event). Scorpius arcs low across the south during the night, while the Summer Triangle—the bright stars Vega, Deneb, and Altair—is in the east at nightfall and soars high overhead in the wee hours. The Big Dipper is high in the north at nightfall early in the month, but a little lower in the northwest by June’s end.
The full Moon of June is known as the Flower Moon, Strawberry Moon, Rose Moon, or Honey Moon.
Perigee June 14
Apogee June 28
Moon phases are Central Time.
Summer officially ended a week ago, but one of its most visible star patterns is still high overhead in the evening. The Summer Triangle consists of the bright stars Deneb, Vega, and Altair. The triangle is directly overhead at about 9 p.m.
The Moon has a bright companion tonight: Antares, the brightest star of the scorpion. It is close to the right of the Moon as they drop down the western sky in early evening.
The closest giant galaxy to the Milky Way is M31, the Andromeda Galaxy. It’s 2.5 million light-years away, but it’s getting closer-by about 250,000 miles every hour. M31 is in the east-northeast at nightfall. Under dark skies, it’s visible as a hazy patch of light.
Messier 31, the Andromeda Galaxy, is the largest and most-distant object that’s easily visible to the unaided eye. Under dark skies, it looks like a skinny cloud about as wide as the Moon. Right now, it’s about a third of the way up in the northeast at nightfall.
Andromeda, the princess, is in the east and northeast as the sky gets good and dark on September nights. It’s not especially bright, but you can find it by looking to the lower left of the more prominent Great Square of Pegasus.
The planet Neptune is in view all night and is brightest for the year, but you need a telescope to see it. You can easily spot its location, though. As night falls, look for Saturn, which looks like a bright star, low in the east. Neptune is to the left of Saturn.
Earth “falls” into a new season today-astronomically speaking. It’s the September equinox, when the Sun crosses the equator from north to south. It marks the start of autumn in the northern hemisphere and spring in the southern hemisphere.
Saturn, the Sun’s second-largest planet, is at its best for the entire year. It looks like a bright star, low in the east at nightfall and climbing high across the south during the night.
Happy Saturn’s Day, the day of the week named for Saturn, the second-largest planet in the solar system. The name is especially fitting today because the planet is at its best for the entire year. It looks like a bright star, shining all night long.
Mars is disappearing in the evening twilight. From the northern part of the country, it’s probably too low in the twilight to see at all. From south of about Dallas, it looks like a fairly bright star quite low in the west-southwest as twilight begins to fade.
