For March 2024, the last quarter moon gives us a real treat on the morning of March 3, when it occults the bright star Antares in Scorpius. For Pensacola observers, the red supergiant vanishes behind the center of the bright half-moon at 12:58 a.m. and will reappear at 1:58 a.m., coming out from behind the northwest limb of the dark side of the lunar disk. Long exposure shots showing the dark side lit by Earthshine, with a video of the moon’s reappearance should be awesome. Also, note that Antares is a close binary star, and its fainter greenish companion may stand alone for a second or so before its primary reappears at about 1:57 a.m.
The waning crescent makes a nice pairing to the right of bright Venus and much fainter Mars on the morning of March 7. The new moon is on March 10, and the next new moon is the total solar eclipse crossing the middle of America. March 10 also is the day we “spring forward.” The moon Venus will disappear into the sun’s glare in the next week, but Mars climbs higher in the dawn this month.
On the evening of March 11, look for the waxing crescent moon above Mercury in the twilight. The Moon passes north of Jupiter on March 13. It is high overhead as first quarter on March 16. The vernal equinox occurs at 10:06 p.m. on March 19 to begin spring in the northern hemisphere. The full moon moves through our lighter penumbral shadow on the morning of March 25, with the slight darkening most noticeable at about 2 a.m. The waning gibbous moon returns to Antares on March 30, marking the 27-day sidereal period as the moon revolves through the starry background.
We have a promising comet, named Pons-Brooks, in the western sky heading sunward now. It has already had several unexpected outbursts, once even developing “horns” telescopically, and may be visible with the naked eye near Jupiter at month’s end.
As noted earlier, it is not a good month for seeing the planets. Mercury is in the western twilight, Venus is headed behind the Sun, Mars is low in the dawn, Jupiter is in the southwest to disappear behind the Sun next month, and Saturn is on the other side of the Sun.
For a detailed map of northern hemisphere skies visit Skymaps.com.
East of Auriga, the twins, Castor and Pollux highlight the Gemini; it is directly above us as darkness falls in early March. South of Gemini, Orion is the most familiar winter constellation, dominating the southern sky at dusk. The reddish supergiant Betelgeuse marks his eastern shoulder, while the blue-white supergiant Rigel stands opposite on his west knee. How bright does Betelgeuse appear to you tonight? In 2019-20, this famed supergiant had expanded and cooled, forming a dust envelope that has darkened much of its southern hemisphere to less than a quarter of its normal brightness in visible light. Now the dust has dissipated, and it is back close to its normal brightness as the alpha star of Orion again.
Just south of the belt, hanging like a sword downward, is M-42, the Great Nebula of Orion, an outstanding binocular and telescopic stellar nursery. The bright diamond of four stars that light it up is the trapezium cluster, one of the finest sights in a telescope and among the youngest known stars.
In the east are the hunter’s two faithful companions, Canis major and minor. Procyon is the bright star in the little dog and rises minutes before Sirius, the brightest star in the sky. Sirius dominates the southeast sky as darkness falls. At eight light years distance, Sirius is the closest star we can easily see with the naked eye from West Florida. When Sirius is highest, along our southern horizon look for the second brightest star, Canopus, getting just above the horizon and sparkling like an exquisite diamond as the turbulent winter air twists and turns this shaft of starlight, after a trip of about 200 years!
To the northeast, look for the bowl of the Big Dipper rising, with the top two stars, the pointers, giving you a line to find Polaris, the Pole Star. In West Florida, it sits unmoving 30 degrees high in our northern sky.
If you take the pointers of the Big Dipper’s bowl to the south, you are guided instead to the head of Leo the Lion rising in the east, looking much like the profile of the famed Sphinx. The bright star at Lion’s heart is Regulus, the “regal star”. The folk wisdom that “March comes in like a Lion” probably refers to the head of Leo rising just after sunset in early March eastern twilight.
The constellation Cancer lies midway between Gemini to the west and Regulus east of it. Almost directly overhead when darkness falls at month’s end, look under dark skies for a faint blur of light in the middle of the four stars that make up the crab’s body. This is the Praespe, or Beehive, cluster, M-44, familiar to the ancients. Its blurry appearance led Charles Messier to include it in his catalog of things that look at first like comets, but do not move and are far away among the stars and galaxies. Now check it out with binoculars, and resolve it into dozens of stars, hence the “Beehive.”
If you follow the handle of the Big Dipper to the south, by 9 p.m. you will be able to “arc to Arcturus”, the brightest star of Spring and distinctly orange in color. Its color is an indication of its uniqueness. Its large speed and direction through the Milky Way suggest it was not formed with our Galaxy, but is a recent capture from the Sagittarius Dwarf Galaxy, a smaller satellite galaxy now being assimilated by our huge spiral galaxy. Many of its lost stars, like Arcturus, follow a band across the sky at about a 70-degree angle to our galactic plane. Arcturus is at the tail of kite-shaped Bootes, the celestial bear driver chasing the two bears from his flocks. Spike south then to Spica in Virgo. Her appearance to the Greeks marked the time to plant, for they associated Virgo with Persephone, daughter of Ceres of the Harvest, returning from six months underground with Pluto to now bless the growth and greening of the upper world. So when Spica rises now at sunset in the southeast, it is time to plant your peas. Likewise, when Persephone goes back down to Hades and disappears in the sun’s glare in September southwest skies, it is time to get your corn in the crib. This cycle goes back to the birth of agriculture.
We have set new dates for our public gazes at Big Lagoon State Park west of Pensacola for Saturdays, March 2 and 16; remember the park gate closes at sunset. For more information on the Escambia Amateur Astronomers and our local star gazes for the public, visit us on the web at sites.google.com/view/escambiaastronomers or join us on Facebook. For gaze info or requests, call Wayne Wooten at (850) 291-9334. You can contact our sponsor, Lauren Rogers, at Pensacola State College at lrogers@pensacolastate.edu.
