Night Sky: Perseid meteor shower, visible planets, and more highlights for August

The Nebula of August

August greets us with quite a few nebulae in the NE skies. Here are three prominent ones.

This is NGC 7974, the Western Veil Nebula.

This nebula has a visual magnitude of +5.0, but it’s extremely difficult to see unless you have a telescope with a good light filter. NGC 6960 was discovered by William Herschel in 1784. It’s believed to be about 2,400 lightyears away from us.

This is M27 the Dumbbell Nebula. It was discovered by Charles Messier in 1764. It has a visual magnitude of +7.4 and is about 1,200 lightyears away from us. If you have a small scope or a good pair of binoculars you should be able to view it.

This is M57, the Ring Nebula.

M57 was discovered in 1779 by Antoine Darquier de Pellepoix. He described it as a dull nebula, as large as Jupiter and looking like a planet. M57 has a visual magnitude of +8.8 and is about 1,400 lightyears away from us. You can see it through a small telescope. I took the image above using an 8” scope and then zoomed in on the nebula.

Both M27 and M57 are Planetary Nebula. William Herschel was the first astronomer to use the term Planetary Nebula, in reference to M57. It appears that he never used that term for M27, although he did apply it to other deep-space objects he discovered.

What you can look for in August’s Night Skies

Starting at 10:00 p.m. on August 1st, a steady line of planets will rise in the Eastern skies, led by Saturn. Neptune is second at 10:23 p.m., Uranus at 1:02, then Mars at 1:39, and Jupiter at 2:06 a.m.

The Perseid meteor shower peaks on August 11, but you can expect to see activity from it long before then.

As the name implies the shooting stars appear to originate in the constellation Perseus. This is a major meteor shower and you can expect about 100 shooting stars per hour. You might be able to spot some activity as early as 10 p.m., but the best viewing is between midnight and 4 a.m. The Perseids are easy to find – simply look to the NNE. Early viewing will put most of the activity near the horizon. As the night progresses, they will get up to about 40 degrees above the horizon.

 Moon Phases:

New Moon is August 4

1st Quarter is August 12

Full Moon is August 19

Last Quarter is August 26