On October evenings, you can see the planets Jupiter, Saturn and Venus in the sky, and the latter is very bright. On October 8, Mercury will be at its shortest distance from Earth, 98.7 million kilometers, according to the astronomical calendar published by the Admiral Vasile Urceanu Observatory. What are the brightest stars in the sky this month?

The month in October 2021

On October 6, the new moon phase comes, at 14:00 the moon is not visible in the period from October 5 to 7. On October 13, the First Square phase begins, at 06:24. The moon is visible in the first half of the night.

On October 20 at 6 p.m., the Full Moon phase arrives. On October 28, the Last Square phase takes place at 11:06 p.m. The moon is visible in the second half of the night.

The course of the planets in October 2021

Every October evening, the planet Venus is visible in the southwest after sunset until 8 p.m. It appears as a very bright white star, not very high above the horizon, about 7 o’clock in the evening.

If you look to the southwest at 7:30 p.m., you will see the planet at the same height above the horizon every October, which will help you identify it.

Venus is the brightest star in the sky besides the Sun and the Moon, and in October it will be in the constellations of Scorpio and Sagittarius, regions that the Milky Way also passes through. If you look through binoculars, you will be able to see the planet in a very rich field of stars.

Between October 15 and 18, Venus will also pass by the star Antares, the brightest star in the constellation Scorpius, which will be below the planet.

Every day, Venus approaches the Earth, starting the month at a distance of 132 million km and ending it 35 million km closer. Through the telescope, Venus will be visible as the Moon in the First Square. The moon passes by on the evenings of October 8, 9, and 10, with the 9th directly above the planet.

The other two planets visible in the sky are Saturn and Jupiter, which are in the same region of the sky and even in the same constellation (Capricorn). To see them, you need to look south, around 21:00, not very high above the horizon. You will see a bright star on the left (Jupiter) and another on the right (Saturn). The two stars do not twinkle like stars, have no obvious colors, and remain in the sky until about 1 am.

Jupiter is brighter because it is twice as close to Saturn. Two planets are very clearly visible in the telescope: Jupiter with bands of clouds and four moons, and Saturn with a system of rings and several moons. Two planets remain in the sky for another two months.

On October nights, the planets Uranus and Neptune are also in the sky, but they cannot be seen with the naked eye.

On October 8, Mercury will be at its closest distance from Earth (at perigee) at a distance of 98.7 million km. On the 9th, the planet will be in conjunction with the Sun, that is, next to it, visible from Earth. On October 25, Mercury is at the maximum elongation of the Sun (18.5 degrees), that is, it is visible in the sky in the morning.

On October 29, the planet Venus is in maximum eastern elongation relative to the Sun (47 degrees), that is, it is visible in the evening sky.

The constellation is visible in the evening sky

Signs of autumn are everywhere in the sky. The Summer Triangle, along with the stars Vega, Altair, and Deneb, are high in the evening sky, but at night they approach the horizon. Sagittarius has moved in, and a brighter star can be seen in the south: Fomalhaut in the Austrian Pisces.

In the southeast, you can see part of the “water sky”, that is, many constellations associated with seas and oceans: Aquarius, Pisces and Whale. They are difficult to identify because they consist of not very bright stars. To the east of Fomalhaut, at about the same height above the horizon, is Deneb Kaitos, the brighter star in the constellation of Kita. Fomalhaut is a nearby star, the light that now reaches us was emitted in 1985. The light from the star Deneb Kaitos (Beta Kita) is 96 years from the Sun.

Closer to the zenith (point overhead) we find Pegasus, the Winged Horse, which contains a landmark that is very easy to identify: the square of Pegasus. Three stars in the constellation and one in Andromeda form a large square. Andromeda joins Pegasus and continues eastward. There it meets M31, the Andromeda Galaxy, the nearest large galaxy to ours visible in binoculars.

To the northeast of Andromeda are Perseus and, above, Cassiopeia, constellations that remind us of winter. To the east of Perseus, to the northeast, there was a very bright star: Capella in the constellation of the Chariot.