Stars over Sisters

If you plan on looking to the night skies this month you are in for a treat. The Orionid meteor shower peaks on the evening of October 21 and morning of October 22. A first-quarter moon will set by about midnight, leaving the sky dark until dawn and providing optimum viewing for this shower. The Orionids exhibit a maximum rate of about 20 meteors per hour, and the fast-moving meteors occasionally leave persistent trains and bright fireballs. If you trace these meteors backward, they seem to come from the Club of the constellation Orion the Hunter. The radiant lies just north of Orion's bright, ruddy star Betelgeuse.

Aquarius is one of the larger, though somewhat indistinct, constellations visible during the autumn season. Two very fine celestial objects are located here. Perhaps the most interesting is the Saturn Nebula, a dying star that is ejecting an elongated shell of gas into nearby space. Through large telescopes this body has a greenish-yellow hue that roughly resembles the planet Saturn.

One of the brighter globular clusters is also found in Aquarius. Comprised of a tightly packed ball of old stars located near the outer regions of our galaxy, it was first cataloged by French astronomer Charles Messier in the mid-eighteenth century.

To the Babylonians, Aquarius represented an overflowing urn and they associated this with the heavy rains which fell in their eleventh month, whilst the Egyptians saw the constellation as Hapi, the god of the Nile.

Greek legend, however, tells of Ganymede, an exceptionally handsome young prince of Troy.

He was spotted by Zeus, who immediately decided that he would make a perfect cup-bearer.

Zeus sent his pet eagle, Aquila, to carry Ganymede to Olympus.

Once Ganymede arrived, he had to contend with the wrath of Hera, wife of Zeus.

She was annoyed that Ganymede was to occupy the favored position previously held by her own daughter Hebe, goddess of youth.

But Zeus was not to be thwarted and Ganymede impressed him with his kindness.

This was made manifest when, realizing how in need of water the people on earth were, he pleaded with Zeus to be allowed to help them and was given permission to send down rain.

Eventually he was glorified as Aquarius, god of rain, and placed amongst the stars.

The planet Saturn has disappeared from the evening sky as it moves to the other side of the sun. Mars will soon suffer a similar fate, but for now hangs very low in the southwest after sunset. Jupiter is now an evening object in Taurus, rising in the east just after 9:30 p.m. at the beginning of October and at 7:30 p.m. by month's end. Venus is in Leo, positioned well above the eastern horizon before sunrise.

The first half of the month will feature a dimming moon; the last half a brightening moon. Specifically, the last-quarter phase occurs on October 8, new (dark) moon on October 15, first-quarter by October 21, and full on October 29.