Today:
The star Arcturus appears around 8:30 PM, as twilight gives way to darker skies, a little less than halfway up in the west. It lowers to about one third of the way up, due west at 9:30 and sets shortly after midnight. This star owes its status as the brightest star in the summer skies to its relatively close proximity, at 36 light years, as well as its enormous size, measuring 37 times the diameter of our Sun.
Tuesday:
The brightening Gibbous Moon overwhelms more and more of the fainter stars, but turning your gaze to the north reveals two patterns that can compete with the Moon’s glow – the Big Dipper, and Cassiopeia, the Queen. The more familiar Big Dipper continues to ease a bit lower into the northwest, the bottom of the Dipper about one third of the way up, while the Queen, shaped like the letter “W”, has risen to one third of the way up in the northeast.
Wednesday:
While the Moon approaches Full, though rather low in the southeast, look to the zenith – the top of the sky – where a bright star shines with a steely-blue light. Vega ranks as the 4th brightest star in the heavens, twice as massive as our Sun, emitting 37 times more light, while converting hydrogen to helium ten times faster than the Sun.