Anyone heavily into astronomy?

[NoMercy]

Went outside this morning while it was still dark, and, looking out to sea, I could see something large and intensely bright in the night sky. It was far too big and bright to be a star. It was much further away than the moon, and so therefore visibly smaller. The visibility of this celestial body remained for a while after all the stars disappeared. Any ideas?

[vascop]

1.)Where are you and
2.)what compass direction were you looking in roughly, and
3.) what time was it?

[NoMercy]

On the Costa Blanca at approx 5:30 this morning (4:30 GMT) and looking out - I would guess - in a South Easterly direction.

[SpodoCommodo]

Jupiter is currently between the moon and due south

[NoMercy]

That's very interesting. At first I pondered whether or not it could be seen with the naked eye, with it being 370m miles away. Googled it, and apparently it can be seen. My initial thought was Venus. Whatever I saw was intensely bright yellow.

[Huderon]

The word planet comes from the Greek meaning wandering star (i.e. a star which appears to move against the background of the other stars). There are 5 of these wandering stars visible to the naked eye Mercury, Venus, Mars, Jupiter and Saturn. And if you want to take a look at this photo you'll see three of them near the moon, plus of course a bit of one other rocky planet :-)

[sqad617]

NoM...I am into "Heavenly Bodies"

[NoMercy]

Well, my t!ts defy gravity, Sqad ! lol

Huderon - whatever it was, it's never been there before, so is some sort of rare planetary alignment perhaps?

[SpodoCommodo]

If you want your very own planetarium to show you what's in the sky at your location then this is very good

http://www.stellarium.org/

It displays what you can curently see at your your longitude/latitude, remove the blue sky to show the stars that are not currently visible, display names, constellations, nebulae, in real time or speeded up time, and lots of other features. And it's free.

[sqad617]

NoM...well if they ever need support.............!!!!LOL

[NoMercy]

Thanks for that link, Spodo !

Sqad - what is that mediterranean heat doing to you? !!

[sqad617]

NoM...nothing to do with the Med....been like it all my life...LOL

Are you with your mother and Ex?

[NoMercy]

The ex has disappeared off somewhere, but I'm with the dog. He is lying in the corner, very quiet. I think it's the heat getting to him.

My mother is back in the UK. She really wanted to come with me again this time.

[sqad617]

NoM...Mornings beautiful......I wake up at about 5.30 a.m, feed the cats, empty the dishwasher and replace all the crockery in the appropriate places. Freshly sqeezed orange juice sipped around the pool, then cup of tea for her "indoors"

[NoMercy]

We have oranges aplenty here in Valencia and plenty of Russians to pick them. Some of those Russians are really fit !!!

[sqad617]

Talking of Russians...we have three brothels on the Island, packed with "fit Russians"and Sout Americans......so I am told.

[paddiez]

Probably Venus,it is now the Morning Star

[NoMercy]

Thanks Paddiez.

Any idea why I've never seen it there before?

Anyhow, I will be looking out for it again later.

[imhotep]

One word.....















FASCINATING!!!
^_^

[Huderon]

lol ... Probably not a rare anything :-) At that time and from that location, Mars, Venus and Mercury were all visible, but given that it was still visible after the stars disappeared, it was almost certainly Venus.

If you have Java installed, Night vision is a nice alternative to Stellarium which Spodo suggested earlier.