Spring officially came with the vernal equinox at 8:50 pm on Friday, when the sun crossed the square equator (picture of the Earth’s equator to the sky). to the north. We now have over 12 hours of daylight and the length of daylight goes up to the summer solstice in mid-June.
Using the equinoxes and solstices to mark the beginning of the four seasons is a convenient way to regulate the movement of time around the world and will work if you are in a place with a long cold spell with short stretches. of heat or the other way around.
The seasons in the southern hemisphere are six months ahead of ours but the equinoxes and solstices, based on the position of the sun relative to the equator, still mark the transitions between the seasons.
Orion and its thinkers Taurus, Gemini, Canis Major, Canis Minor and Auriga are high in the south at sunset but as we get further into the spring season, we see them located in the closer west. at sunset. The appearance of Leo in the east in the evening occurs with the arrival of spring.
You can find Leo’s head by extending the two-star line at the end of the bowl of the Big Dipper part of Ursa Major down (right) under the bowl and look for a question mark back in the sky. That’s the lion’s head and chest. The triangle to the left of that is Leo’s hip and tail.
One thing I said growing up was that March “came in like a lion and out like a lamb. “In primary school, we made lion and lamb masks out of paper plates – an effective way of making sure the children remembered what they had said. Where I grew up, the beginning of March can be a bit stormy and the weather usually settles a bit for April, so I thought the phrase had to be relating to the weather patterns.
Well, that wouldn’t work for Bakersfield and other places in the southwestern U.S., so I thought maybe that should be said with the Leo rising in the east in the March evening. Aries is the only constellation associated with a lamb and rises in the evening sky in September. In March, Aries rises once or twice after sunrise. Well, that lowers my hopes of trying to find a celestial reason for saying.
In the evening sky, Mars is the single planet. At the head of Taurus is the bull about half an arm wide at arm’s length above the orange-red eye of Taurus, the star Aldebaran. Compare their colors. Which one is redder? At the end of the month, Mars will be next to the west horn.
Back on Mars
Perseverance goes through its steps because all systems are scrutinized. Thousands of photos of Mars were already sent back in the first month, which is close to my photography level when they were on a trip. One particularly stunning image is a full 360-degree panorama from where it landed. O the places we go!
The Sustainability team is working with the Navajo Nation to name interesting scientific features with words in the Navajo language. The surface missions nickname features to a common reference to team members that are easier to remember than something like “rock 42 at site 3.” Previous missions used the names of geological regions on Earth. and people and places associated with journeys. rubbing in a quad area named after the Canyon De Chelly National Monument, which is at the heart of the Navajo Nation in Arizona. Maaz is the first closely studied rock, meaning “Mars” in Navajo. Navajo Nation President Jonathan Nez hopes the partnership they have built with NASA will help revitalize their language.
Sometime within the next month, the Ingenuity helicopter should be released. His only purpose as a technology demonstrator is to see if it is possible to fly on Mars for even just a few feet. There are two cameras on board, one color and one black-and-white. If we get pictures from the helicopter, that shouts at the cake.
The other two recently arrived ones, the UAE Hope orbiter and Tianwen-1 in China, have also returned beautiful images. Former orbiters continue their work, including Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter which is now in its 15th year and the lifelong hero, Odyssey, has been orbiting Mars since October 24, 2001.
In the night sky
The moon is at the level of the first quarter next to the Gemini legs high in the south at sunset. On March 28, he will be at full capacity among Virgo stars.
In the early morning, look for Jupiter and Saturn low east on either side of Capricornus. Jupiter is the brightest thing you can see in the eastern skies just before sunrise.
Columnist Nick Strobel is the director of William M. Thomas Planetarium at Bakersfield College and author of the award-winning website AstronomyNotes.com.