STAR HUSTLER
THE INTERNATIONAL EDITION
STAR HUSTLER is seen nationally on most PBS stations. If it is not currently
on your PBS station we suggest you contact your local PBS programming director
and let them know it is available free to all PBS stations. You may take
a months worth of STAR HUSTLER off satellite for personal use, classroom
use, astronomy club use, etc.
1000th Show
To Be Aired : Monday 2/3/97 through Sunday 2/9/97
Horkheimer: Greetings, greetings, fellow star gazers, and have we ever got
a week and a half for you. And even though one of the events may be very
difficult to see, and occurs early this week, nevertheless I feel it's extremely
important that some of you attempt to find an outrageously close pairing
of the two brightest planets on Wednesday morning, February 5th. Simply
go outside about 20 minutes before sunrise and face East where you will
see a lovely crescent moon and planet Mercury just below it. And if you
have a clear, absolutely flat horizon you may be lucky enough to catch
Jupiter and Venus side by side separated by only 3/10ths of 1 degree. Don't
miss this please, but remember you must have an absolutely clear, flat horizon.
Now the next morning, Thursday the 6th, although Jupiter and Venus
won't be quite as close they will still be eye-catching as will also
be an even skinnier Moon also close to the horizon. However, the next day
Friday the 7th, some not-so-good cosmic news especially if you happen to
live in tidal areas because Friday the 7th's New Moon will be the closest
New Moon of the entire year, 33,000 miles closer than the farthest New Moon
in September and will bring very high tides due to the extra gravitational
pull on our watery planet. So be forewarned. Two days later on Sunday the
9th, if you go outside after sunset you will see an exquisite 2 day
old crescent moon floating eerily in the twilight. And if you look
up and to its left you will see the planet it will visit the following
evening. Indeed, on Monday night the 10th, the night before Mardi Gras,
you will see an exquisite pairing of a 3 day old moon and the ringed planet
Saturn. And if you have a small telescope and use at least 40 power, you
will see Saturn's exquisite ring system. And if you also aim your telescope
at the crescent moon, at the curved line that separates the night time part
of the moon, what we call the terminator, you will see exquisite shadows
climbing up mountainsides and falling down into craters. And as a consolation
prize to those of you who missed the Venus/Jupiter pairing on the 5th, we
have something you absolutely should be able to see Wednesday morning
February 12th, at dawn, just before sunrise, because in just one week's
time Jupiter will have glided up to meet Mercury while Mercury will have
dipped down to meet Jupiter and thus they will appear side by side only
one degree apart. What a great time for a planetary pairing. And now, just
a word of thanks to all you viewers who have watched "Star Hustler"
for more than 20 years, because this show marks the 1,000th episode. So
once again, after the 999th time, may I remind you all to Keep Looking Up!
* This week's Sky At A Glance and Planet
Roundup from Sky & Telescope.
This week's Sky At A Glance displays current week only.
To Be Aired : Monday2/10/97 thru Sunday 2/16/97
Horkheimer: Greetings, greetings, fellow star gazers, and as I said 3
weeks ago, if you haven't done so already, now is absolutely the time to
start your Comet Hale-Bopp watch because from the beginning of this week,
February 10th to the 20th you will have no bright moonlight in the sky to
wipe out the fainter light of the tail of Comet Hale-Bopp. And although
as I write this episode experts are still disagreeing as to how bright Hale-Bopp
will be during February, nevertheless most agree that its overall brightness
should equal that of the brightest stars in the Big Dipper. And how bright
it will get at its peak is still subject to debate. You see, back when Hale-Bopp
was discovered in July of '95 the experts soon realized that this comet
was hundreds of times brighter than Halley's Comet was at the same distance
which means that Comet Hale-Bopp is intrinsically much larger than Halley's
Comet, larger even than last year's wonderful Comet Hyakutake. And if Hale-Bopp
could come as close to Earth as Hyakutake did it would indeed be brighter
than any comet in the past 150 years. But unfortunately its closest approach
will be over 100 million miles farther away than Hyakutake. But because
it is so much bigger than Hyakutake it may still be even brighter. Here's
how fast it is approaching us: On February 1st it was 185 million miles
away from us. One week later, 175 million. This week, on Valentine's Day
the 14th, it will be only 162 million miles away; on the 21st, 150 million
and the last day of February, the 28th, 139 million; March 7th, 130; March
14th, 124; and March 22nd, at its closest, only 122 million miles away!
So please start your viewing this week because you will able to watch it
brighten night after night and hopefully watch its tail grow longer and
longer. To see it at its optimum, from February 10th through February 20th,
go out every morning between 5 and 5:30 A.M. and look East where you will
see the 3 bright stars of the Summer Triangle. And from the 10th through
the 20th you will be able to watch Hale-Bopp as it tracks right alongside
our old friend Cygnus the Swan, whose tail star, Deneb, marks one corner of
the triangle. To optimize viewing you must be as far away from any artificial
lighting as possible. And to really see the tail change from day to day
use a pair of binoculars. Indeed, if you've never owned a pair of binoculars
before, now is the time to get a pair. My personal recommendation is
a pair of 7 by 50 binoculars, and you don't need expensive ones, the cheapest
ones will do. And while you're looking up at this flying cosmic iceberg
with its several million mile long tail, keep in mind that the last time
it visited us was 4200 years ago when the Great Pyramids were almost brand
new. Oh what a different world Hale-Bopp will see this time around as it
looks down on us as we Keep Looking Up!
* This week's Sky At A Glance and Planet
Roundup from Sky & Telescope.
This week's Sky At A Glance displays current week only.
STAR HUSTLER is seen nationally on most PBS stations. If it is not currently
on your PBS station we suggest you contact your local PBS programming director
and let them know it is available free to all PBS stations. You may take
a months worth of STAR HUSTLER off satellite for personal use, classroom
use, astronomy club use, etc.
Notice : These are rough drafts of the scripts for STAR HUSTLER. Changes
may well be made as production requires.
To Be Aired : Monday 2/1797 through Sunday 2/23/97
Horkheimer: Greetings,greetings fellow star gazers and if you haven't started
watching already, well now is the time to begin your regular watch of the
best planet of the year, Mars, which is racing towards us as I speak and
will reach its closest and brightest on St. Patrick's Day March 17th. Let
me show you: OK, we've set our skies so that we're facing East around 9
pm any night through the end of this month where you'll see our old friend,
Leo the Lion, climbing the eastern sky, being just a little higher each
successive night at the same time. His head and mane marked by a sickle-shaped
group of stars, his hind quarters marked by a right triangle. And just below
his tail, which is the star called Denebola, you will see a brightish rouge-gold
light which is the planet Mars. And if you look down and to the left of
Mars you will see a similarly colored star Arcturus, and although most of
the time Mars is much much dimmer than Arcturus, right now because Mars
is racing towards us, it is significantly brighter and will continue to
brighten all the way through St. Patrick's Day. In fact, from the first
day of this month to St. Patrick's Day Mars will grow 275% brighter. And
you'll actually be able to watch it brighten if you go out and look for
it at least a couple of times a week. And because Mars is so very close
right now if you have a small telescope you'll actually be able to see Mars'
ice cap at its North Pole. And in case you're wondering what causes that
reddish brown , rouge-gold color think of Mars as the rusty planet because
it's the iron oxides in the Martian rocks and sand which gives Mars its
distinctive hues. In fact, while our Earth is 70% covered with water and
would look bluish-white through a small telescope on Mars, most of
Mars is covered by great rocky deserts and humongous sand dunes so that
when you look at Mars through a telescope on Earth the bright light areas
are the vast areas of sand while the dark areas are the mountains,
canyons and craters from which the winds have blown the sand away. In fact,
at least 5 times in the past 150 years Mars has appeared absolutely featureless
without any dark areas whatsoever whenever gigantic planet-wide sand and
dust storms completely engulfed Mars and obscured every single surface feature
from view. Indeed, as bad luck would have it, back in 1971 when we sent
Mariner 9 to investigate Mars, just before it arrived Mars was caught up
in a monstrous global sand storm which completely wiped out every surface
feature from view and it was only after the storm let up, after 2 1/2 months
of circling the planet that Mariner was finally able to see the Martian
surface and discover its great grand canyon, now named The Valley of
Mariner. So begin your Mars watch now because who knows whether or not a
planet-wide dust storm will whip up between now and Mars' closest approach
on St. Paddy's Day which is one more good reason to remember to Keep Looking
Up!
* This week's Sky At A Glance and Planet
Roundup from Sky & Telescope.
This week's Sky At A Glance displays current week only.
STAR HUSTLER is seen nationally on most PBS stations. If it is not currently
on your PBS station we suggest you contact your local PBS programming director
and let them know it is available free to all PBS stations. You may take
a months worth of STAR HUSTLER off satellite for personal use, classroom
use, astronomy club use, etc.
Notice : These are rough drafts of the scripts for STAR HUSTLER. Changes
may well be made as production requires.
To Be Aired : Monday 2/24/97 through Sunday 3/2/97
Horkheimer: Greetings, greetings, fellow star gazers, and I wish I had a
dollar for every time someone asked me ,"What are the names of those
three stars in the belt of Orion the Hunter?" Because their names are
so rythmical and just so plain nifty sounding that once you hear them you
just kinda like to say them. And since I haven't mentioned them by name
for over two years let's not only do so now but let's also take a journey
to these three wonders of the Great Hunter. To find them, for the next few
weeks simply go outside just after it gets dark out and face South, where
you'll easily find these 3 stars, equally spaced in a perfect row, the only
3 such equally spaced stars visible to the naked eye. In western civilization
we see these three as the belt stars of the mythical Orion the Mighty Hunter,
so naturally the 2 bright stars below them mark Orion's knees and the 2
bright stars above, his shoulders. Now the reason these three stars are
my favorite stars of all to pronounce is because they sound so much like
they came right out of American Indian folklore, although they are Arabic
in origin. From left to right they are: Alnitak, Alnilam and Mintaka. I
mean, doesn't that sound native American? Alnitak, Alnilam, Mintaka...like
a line right out of Hiawatha? At any rate on many a night as a youngster
I wished that I could just momentarily shut off gravity and fly faster than
the speed of light to visit these three tantalizing beacons. Then later
when I really got serious about the science of astronomy I discovered that
in factual imagination I could. So let me take you on an imaginary but scientifically
factual journey to these 3 wonders of winter nights. our first stop only
93 million miles away will be our own Sun which is a very average yellow
star with a relatively cool surface temperature of 10 thousand degrees fahrenheit
and a rather meager diameter, less than 1 million miles wide. Then from
our Sun let's fly on the wings of the gods 12 hundred light years away to
Alnilam, ther middle star of Orion's belt which burns a blue hot 51 thousand
degrees fahrenheit and dwarfs our Sun because we could line up 16 of our
Suns across its middle. Alnitak, on the other hand, is 100 light years farther
beyond being 1300 light years away. And although only 9 times the diameter
of our Sun, it burns an even hotter blue, 53 thousand degrees fahrenheit.
The longest journey however, is to Mintaka, more than twice the distance
from Earth as Alnitak or Alnilam, being 2400 light years away, but burning
a bit cooler, at 45 thousand degrees and a bit smaller, only 6 1/2 times
the size of our Sun. Alnitak , Alnilam, Mintaka. If we could line them up
side by side with our Sun, their sizes and temperatures would make our star
seem puny by comparison. Indeed, even my childhood flights of fancy couldn't
come close to their reality and wonder which you can see for yourself if
you just Keep Looking Up!
* This week's Sky At A Glance and Planet
Roundup from Sky & Telescope.
This week's Sky At A Glance displays current week only.
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