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In the 1990s, astronomer Joe Patterson self-published a zine he called "Big Apple Astronomy." In this column, Patterson brings back his beloved daily guide to sky-viewing with a new calendar every month.

In the 1990s, astronomy professor Joe Patterson wrote and illustrated a seasonal newsletter, in the style of an old-fashioned paper zine, of astronomical highlights visible from New York City. His affable style mixed wit and history with astronomy for a completely charming, largely undiscovered cult classic: Big Apple Astronomy. For Broadcast, Joe shares current monthly issues of Big Apple Sky Calendar, the guide to sky viewing that used to conclude the seasonal newsletter. Steal a few moments of reprieve from the city’s mayhem to take in these sights. As Oscar Wilde said, “we are all in the gutter, but some of us are looking at the stars.”

Throughout February, the brilliant Venus—shining low in the SW sky—has been slowly moving up in the evening twilight as it approaches Jupiter from the west. Tonight, it finally catches up, passing less than a degree to the southwest of mighty Jupiter. What a sight—the two most brilliant starlike objects, practically on top of each other. Actually, they're both moving 

 among the stars; but Venus is moving much faster, so you'll easily notice the difference in appearance among the dates February 27-March 3. Best planetary conjunction in years! But it's low in the southwest, so get thee away from buildings. A good pair of binoculars might show the moons of Jupiter and the phase of Venus.

I saw my first solar eclipse from the water's edge in Virginia Beach, in 1970. I came back to New York and wrote a story about it. The next day, I went out and bought my first telescope… and that’s how I found out what I wanted to do with my life. That Sun-Moon geometry repeats exactly every 18 years, 11 days, and 8 hours (the famous Babylonian 

 period)… so every 54 years and 34 days, the Earth has rotated around to be in almost exactly the same position. So along with a couple million other eclipse chasers, I'll be on hand to greet the eclipse, somewhere in the eastern USA on April 8th, 2024.

In writing about solar eclipses, the American poet Annie Dillard wrote: “Partial eclipses are very interesting. They bear the same relation to total eclipses as kissing a man does to marrying a man, or as flying in an airplane does to falling out of an airplane. Although the one experience precedes the other, it in no way prepares you for it.”

On this day in 1979, Pioneer 10, nearing Jupiter, snapped an historic photo of Io, the innermost of Jupiter's famous four bright moons. It showed a prominent plume—a volcano—erupting from its surface! In retrospect, it seemed pretty clear what it was. Io is the innermost moon, so Jupiter's immense gravity would inflict a “differential” force on the front and back side of it. This constant stirring could produce giant volcanic eruptions. Later close study of Saturn and Neptune’s moons also showed similar phenomena.

On this day in 1977, the rings of Uranus were discovered. Jim Elliot, a young MIT astronomer, had reserved time aboard the Kuiper Airborne Observatory (KAO) to observe Uranus as it occulted a star. The idea was to watch the star slowly dim as its light was absorbed by Uranus's atmosphere. This had been done previously for Jupiter and Saturn, but never for Uranus. They didn't want to trust the vagaries of Earth’s weather, so they used the KAO Observatory, which flies above all weather (around 75,000 feet).

A few minutes before the expected dimming, the star disappeared, then reappeared, then disappeared again. They thought: all is lost, the equipment is malfunctioning, and at just the critical moment. Some minutes later, the pattern repeated, but on the other side of the planet.  When they got back to MIT, they thought: might they have witnessed absorption of starlight by a dark

 around Uranus? These dips occurred symmetrically on either side of Uranus—so that seemed to be the answer!

Rings were later also discovered around Neptune, Saturn, and Jupiter, so they seem to be natural for the outer gas giants. “Planetary rings” is now a big subject in astronomy.

The date of the semi-annual rip in the fabric of time, scheduled for 2 am EST on Sunday, March 12th (“spring ahead, fall back”). It’s in effect just about everywhere in the U.S., except Hawaii and Arizona, where they presumably don't need any help Saving Daylight. There's now a growing movement in Congress for 

 Daylight Savings Time—as if you can actually save daylight by legal action. What it would do is rob mornings of one hour of daylight and give it to the evenings. That would be good for after-work golf and company softball games, but bad for schoolchildren who would have to wait for their morning buses in total darkness in December and January. In 1973-74, there 

 year-round Daylight Savings Time (to save energy, supposedly)… and there were some deadly bus accidents in northern states in the winter. I'm a golfer… but here's a vote for permanent Standard Time.

The anniversary of the discovery of Uranus—the first planet to join the planets of antiquity—by William Herschel in 1781. Uranus was the father of Saturn and the grandfather of Jupiter; William was the brother of Caroline Herschel and the father of John Herschel—famous astronomers all! Although the discovery date is credited as March 13th, the object was sighted and catalogued as a star many times previously. On March 13th, Herschel realized that it changed positions in the sky… and he therefore classified it as a comet. (Since all

were known in antiquity, the idea of “discovering” a new planet was just too weird to contemplate.) After tracking it for two more years, he realized that it had no tail, and orbited in a near circle outside the orbit of Saturn. QED: PLANET. Herschel wanted to call it Sidus Georgium (Star of George) to curry favor with the English monarch. But Americans will recall that during 1781-83, George III had to deal with issues more serious than planets.

PI DAY, the occasion of math celebrations in many schools, after the celebrated transcendental number 3.14159… (known to at least 62 trillion places), which is the ratio of a circle’s circumference to its diameter. Also the birthday in 1879 of Albert Einstein. π is prominent in Einstein's famous equation of general relativity (Gμν = 8πGTμν), but we're pretty sure that he didn't know π to any more places than the average 8th grader (3.14).

Pi was well-known to ancient Hindu and Arab mathematicians, but its computation seemed not to interest European scientists. Isaac Newton once wrote that he was “ashamed” of working out the number to 16 places. I guess that's what separates the mathematicians from mere physicists.

There are other almost-as-famous numbers: the golden ratio 1.618, famous in science and art, and the “base of natural logarithms” 

 = 2.718, plus my personal favorite, the e

 numbers—a nice mystical name. Unfortunately, with our months never exceeding 31 days, none are suited to celebrate on calendar dates.

The ides of March, when Julius Caesar was assassinated in the Roman Senate.

 at 5:23 pm EDT. No matter where you live on Earth, the Sun today rises exactly in the east, sets exactly in the west, and is in your sky exactly 12 hours. Hence equi-nox (equal night). 

 for the ~0.0001% of humanity “living” within a few degrees of the North or South Poles. For them, the Sun just 

 the eastern or western horizon as it rises or sets—executing a huge 360 degree daily spiral, always within a few degrees of the horizon.

New Moon 1:26 pm EDT. On the nights following (mainly March 23-26), look for a thin crescent Moon low in the west 30-70 minutes after sunset. You might see the “unlit” portion of the Moon glowing with a faint light—“the old Moon in the new Moon's arms.” A really beautiful sight in binoculars!

On these nights, watch for the lunar crescent close to the brilliant Venus about 40-50 minutes after sunset.

Pretty close to the vernal equinox, and the exact date for the beginning of the year in Merry Olde Englande. Hence some of the names for months: SEPTember was the seventh month, OCTober the eighth, NOVember the ninth. DECember was the tenth. January and February were just add-ons to be endured; what could you do when it was so cold, and the Earth so barren?

In 1752, Parliament decided to eat humble pie and adopt the calendar reform instituted by Pope Gregory and adopted by most of the Catholic world in 1582: henceforth the year number would change over on January 1. As for March 25th, it was pretty close to the equinox (nice)—but more importantly, it was precisely the Feast of the Annunciation, when the archangel Gabriel announced you-know-what to a certain surprised young woman. And let's see... if you count exactly nine months after that date, you come to another interesting date. A few astronomers were probably paid a few quid to make it all fit together.

First quarter Moon at 9:32 pm. On this night and the previous, the Moon passes just north of Mars.

Big Apple Sky Calendar: March 2023

In the 1990s, astronomy professor Joe Patterson wrote and illustrated a seasonal newsletter, in the style of an old-fashioned paper zine, of astronomical highlights visible from New York City. His affable style mixed wit and history with astronomy for a completely charming, largely undiscovered cult classic: Big Apple Astronomy. For 

, Joe shares current monthly issues of Big Apple Sky Calendar, the guide to sky viewing that used to conclude the seasonal newsletter. Steal a few moments of reprieve from the city’s mayhem to take in these sights. As Oscar Wilde said, “we are all in the gutter, but some of us are looking at the stars.”

These are the two good February nights to look for overflights of New York City by the International Space Station (ISS). On the night of February 1st, the ISS flies over NYC from 6:39 to 6:43 pm EST, and appears around magnitude -3.9—just about the brightest thing in the sky. The next night is a repeat performance from 5:50 to 5:56 pm EST. In both cases, look for it first in the west, then passing nearly overhead before disappearing in the eastern sky. If you spot it, you’ll be shocked at how quickly it disappears—high in the northeast sky, as it enters the Earth’s shadow.

This is one of the “cross-quarter days,” midway between the solstice and the equinox (the others are Mayday, Lammas, and All Saints’ Day). In the Christian liturgy it’s called Candlemas. But in the U.S. it’s much better known as Groundhog Day, the subject of media hilarity and a really excellent 1993 film of the same name.

On this night in 1913, people from Saskatchewan to Brazil were witness to the 

Several hundred meteors streamed slowly across the sky, as if in a crude formation, before winking out a full three minutes later, over the mid-Atlantic. This shocked astronomers because the meteors seemed to last ~100 times as long as typical meteors and moved in formation. It also terrified others, who thought it might signify the end of the world. In retrospect, the procession may have been the spiral and breakup of a very small comet or asteroid recently snagged by the Earth’s gravity. There may well be thousands of such objects out there, and perhaps only the vastness of space makes these encounters extremely rare.

There’s a concept in physics known as “the Roche limit.” If a small object (say the Moon) gets close enough to a massive object (say the Earth) that the Earth’s gravity on the near side of the Moon significantly exceeds that on the Moon’s far side, then the Moon may be ripped into little pieces. But those pieces would continue, more or less, in the orbit they had before the fragmentation. Monsieur Roche worked out the math long ago, and used it to explain the likely origin of Saturn’s rings. This could explain the Meteoric Procession of 1913.

Abraham Lincoln’s birthday … and also Charles Darwin’s. Same year, too (1809). An excellent day for humanity.

On this day in 1564, Galileo was born in Pisa. And three short days later in Rome, Michelangelo died. If you’re looking for a precise week to signify the transition from “The Renaissance” to “Modern Science,” look no further.

Starting in mid-February and continuing for ~two weeks, Venus and Jupiter will stage a beautiful show in the western sky during evening twilight. For the first week, Jupiter will be the higher of the two brilliant planets. With each day, Venus will creep slowly higher and Jupiter will sink slowly lower.

On this night in 1930, Clyde Tombaugh, a young amateur astronomer, found a “star” which moved slightly from night to night … and the orbital solution showed an elliptical orbit out beyond the orbit of Neptune. A ninth planet! It was announced to the world as “Pluto” a few weeks later. But some oddities had already showed up. Its orbit actually takes it 

Neptune’s orbit for 20 years of the 248-year orbit. Pretty weird. And it was six magnitudes fainter than Neptune. Why so faint? Was this alleged new planet practically 

The 1980s and ’90s brought discoveries of thousands of new members of the solar system. They were all dubbed minor planets or asteroids. The seven biggest, including Pluto, are now called dwarf planets. Discovery never ceases, and nomenclature lags behind it. So if you’re still a ninth-planet holdout for Pluto, it’s not looking good … but neither did the Mets’ chances in 1969.

Anniversary of John Glenn’s three-orbit flight aboard the U.S. spacecraft Friendship 7 in 1962. This event and its background were colorfully depicted in 

—a 1993 movie and 1979 book by Tom Wolfe. Both superb.

On these nights, Venus and Jupiter are still close together, but the waxing crescent Moon now approaches to form a beautiful trio in the southwestern sky around 6:00–6:30 pm. Beautiful! … if you have a clear view low in the southwest.


Washington’s birthday in 1732. But if you were present in the birthing room, the wall calendar would have read February 11th, 1731. Why? Well, Virginia was an English colony, and the Brits had not yet accepted Pope Gregory’s calendar reform of 1582. (Some people took another few centuries. That’s why Russia’s “October Revolution” is celebrated on November 8th.)

That explains the 11-day discrepancy. The “year” issue seems weirder, by modern reckoning. The English year started on March 25th, the traditional date for the vernal equinox. So all February dates were in the 11th month of 1731, not the second of 1732.

Nowadays, nearly all dates are reckoned in the modern style, regardless of what calendar system prevailed at the time. Plenty of room for argument, if you’re feeling disputatious.

High in tonight’s evening sky, the Moon approaches Mars from the west, while the Jupiter-Venus conjunction continues low in the southwestern sky.

February 2023

Big Apple Sky Calendar: February 2023

On this date in 1801—the very first night of the 19th century—Giuseppe Piazzi found a slowly moving starlike object, which he assumed to be a comet (at that time, only the planets of antiquity were known). But was it a comet? Maybe not, because it showed no tail or fuzz. Only a few precise observations were obtained before it was lost in the glare of the Sun. Fortunately, a very young Carl Friedrich Gauss—now regarded as the greatest mathematician since Archimedes—became interested in how to derive an orbit from a mere three observations. He successfully predicted where the object would be when it emerged from the solar glare and later showed that it moved in a nearly circular orbit between Mars and Jupiter, sort of like an actual planet.

The object was named Ceres, after the Roman god of agriculture. It was the first known asteroid, or “minor planet” (the currently favored term). There are now many thousands known, most quite small and in the 

 have gone berserk. For a good time, google “funny asteroid names,” and if you 

 an asteroid (plus solve for the orbit), you can even contribute to the madness.

There was another planetary puzzle that dogged astronomers throughout the 19th century: the motion of Mercury. It did not exactly obey Newton’s Laws, and some astronomers thought there could be another planet, close to the Sun and tugging slightly on Mercury. It even got a name: 

(of course). On this day in 1860, the French astronomer Urbain Le Verrier announced that he had discovered (through calculation) the orbit of Vulcan. But no one ever actually saw it. There were scattered claims of seeing the 

of unknown objects crossing in front of the Sun. But none were confirmed, and Mercury’s odd motion wasn’t explained until Einstein’s General Theory (in 1915) showed that the geometry of space in the near vicinity of the Sun is slightly non-Euclidean.

—as close as it ever gets to the Sun, just 0.983 AU. Amid January’s deep freeze, this may be surprising. But remember that the seasons are caused not by distance, but by the 

 of the Earth’s axis. The variation in distance (0.98 AU in January, versus 1.02 AU in July) is not enough to make a big difference.

Still, wouldn’t you expect that the maximally close Sun in January and the maximally distant Sun in July would give the northern hemisphere warmer winters and cooler summers? The 

is true—the highest recorded temperature on Earth is 136 degrees Fahrenheit (Death Valley) and the lowest is -109 degrees Fahrenheit (Yakutsk, Siberia). Can you guess the reason for the extremes being reached in the north rather than the south? (The answer is not beyond dispute, but it’s interesting to think about.)

The anniversary of Galileo’s death, in 1642. Still under house arrest from the Inquisition, Galileo hung on just long enough to get his magnum opus on dynamics (

) smuggled out to Holland, where it could be published. On this precise date three centuries later, another adventurer in space and time was born: Stephen Hawking. Hawking showed that the two bedrock principles of 20th-century physics—relativity and quantum theory—can actually be reconciled if black holes emit some radiation (“Hawking radiation”). It has never been observed, but we’re still looking!

On these four nights in 1610, Galileo turned his telescope on Jupiter and noticed four stars moving around the planet—the “Galilean satellites,” as we now call them. Or the 

, as Galileo called them, in an effort to curry favor with his patron, Cosimo de Medici (a boy of nine). This discovery did a lot to demolish the Ptolemaic model of planetary motions. It had previously been argued: “If the Earth moves, how can it hang onto the Moon?” Well, there was Jupiter up there, obviously moving around 

, and having no difficulty hanging onto its moons.

Before the discovery scene in Bertolt Brecht’s play “Life of Galileo,” a curtain appears with the ominous words: “January 10, 1610: Heaven Abolished.”

On this date in 1706, Benjamin Franklin was born in Boston. Ben was a voracious reader from an early age, though he only attended school for two years. School was hardly necessary for Ben; his enormous curiosity, energy, and talent took him far beyond anything he could have obtained from formal schooling. Among the European intellectuals of his era—who famously disdained everything outside their continent—he was regarded as arguably the greatest scientist in the world. Immanuel Kant called him "the modern Prometheus," who "stole fire from the gods." Less arguably, he was the greatest statesman, educator, and diplomat in American history. Many historians credit him as essentially winning the Revolutionary War through securing the alliance with France (where he spent the War as an ambassador).

In 1783, Franklin attended a demonstration in Paris of the first hot air balloon carrying human passengers. A bystander reportedly said something like "nice, but hardly useful," and Franklin replied, "Of what use, sir, is a newborn child?"

Tonight, look for the brilliant Venus, low in the southwest an hour after sunset. The medium-bright starlike object next to it is Saturn, as a telescopic look will confirm. But you’ll need a really good southwestern horizon. For each night throughout the winter and spring, Venus will creep slightly higher in the southwestern evening sky. A good time to get acquainted with our sister planet.

Tonight the lunar crescent takes aim at Jupiter, the brightest starlike object in the sky.

A good night for stargazing! Mars will be just to the left of the waxing gibbous Moon tonight. Watch the Moon slowly approach from the west. Around 11:30 pm it nearly 

(passes in front of) Mars. Pretty cool thing to watch! Although it’s a near miss unless you live ~1000 miles south of NYC, where an actual occultation will be seen.

January 2023

Big Apple Sky Calendar: January 2023

Mars at opposition. This term means it's “opposite” the Sun in the sky. Therefore it rises at sunset, is directly south (but VERY high in the sky, nearly overhead) at midnight, and sets at sunrise. Also, it’s as close to the earth as it ever gets—just 48 million miles. Therefore it's very bright—about as bright as Sirius, the brightest star in the sky. Shining with its distinctive baleful red color, Mars is a beautiful sight on all December nights. And on good nights, it will be a great target for telescopic viewing throughout the month.

The first-quarter Moon passes just south of Jupiter tonight.

On this date in 1942, the first controlled, self-sustaining nuclear chain reaction was achieved by the “Manhattan Project” scientists—in an underground squash court at the University of Chicago. Working under the direction of Enrico Fermi, the team found that by bombarding uranium with neutrons, the uranium would fission into lighter elements, together with more neutrons, which would immediately find more uranium to fission—each time with energy release (because mass is lost, and E=mc^2). This was the basis of the atomic bomb. They basically knew this would happen, but needed to find a way to control the reaction—otherwise you couldn't build a bomb without blowing yourself up. After the tense but successful experiment, the team cabled to the super-secret agency, “The Italian Navigator has discovered the New World.” The cryptic reply came: “How were the natives?”, eliciting the answer “very friendly.”

On these four nights, the International Space Station (ISS) makes overpasses which will be easily visible to NYC observers. In each case, the ISS will first be visible low in the northwest, then brighten as it quickly rises higher, then finally disappear about four minutes later, in the eastern half of the sky. You can tell it's not a plane because (a) it doesn't blink and (b) it disappears—when it enters the Earth's shadow. These particular overpasses are the brightest of the month, because they occur pretty close to overhead. It's a great return for five minutes of viewing!

You can study the times yourself from the website 

All magnitude -3.5 (about as bright as Venus), and all starting low in the northwest.

Death of Omar Khayyam in 1148. Perhaps the last of the great Persian astronomers… and my favorite.

Full Moon 11:09 pm EST. The Full Moon is just north of Mars tonight. Since Mars is essentially opposite the Sun (see December 1 entry), and since the Full Moon is by definition opposite the Sun, Mars and the Moon must be very close! A dramatic sight up there, northwest of Orion.

Earliest Sunset for NYC (4:28 pm EST). This might be surprising—why isn't it the December solstice, which is always the shortest day (nine hours and 15 minutes)? It's because the exact time of “solar noon” (when the Sun is directly south) wanders by as much as 15 minutes during the year, due to the Sun's inconstant motion (owing to the slight eccentricity in the Earth's orbit). Also, it's only “earliest” by a gnat's eyelash. NYC sunset only varies by 10 minutes for EVERY December day.


On these nights, Mars passes close to the famous bright stars in Gemini: Castor and Pollux.

This morning (basically midnight to dawn on the 14th) is the peak night for the 

 meteor shower. The Geminids are the strongest and most reliable of the annual showers, but are basically confined to the post-midnight hours since Gemini is below the horizon during the evening. I recommend 2 am to dawn—plus a good sleeping bag and a vantage point well away from city and local lights—and at least one companion. Meteor-watching can be a joyful shared activity, but the long intervals of meteor-less cold really need conversation to spice things up! Also, LIE DOWN; human necks are not naturally designed for this activity.

And after the meteors, drink a toast to Tycho Brahe, born on this day in Denmark in 1546. Tycho's exacting measurements of planetary motions, all done before the invention of telescopes, were the key ingredient to Kepler’s subsequent discovery of the laws of planetary motion.

Last quarter Moon, rising around midnight.

During these ten days in 1995, the Hubble Telescope stared at one spot in space, a direction possessing no special properties—just a random direction, away from any planetary objects, known galaxies, bright stars, etc. The idea was to take the deepest possible image—to sample what the Universe is like at enormous distances, with minimum clutter by nearby stuff.  This historic image, the "Hubble Deep Field," contained ~3000 galaxies, most of which proved to be at enormous distances. It greatly expanded our knowledge of the early Universe, before most of the stars we know about today ever formed.

Isaac Newton was born on this day in 1642. Isaac's father died a few months earlier, and Isaac's mother soon remarried, leaving the young Isaac to the care of his grandparents. René Descartes, the other intellectual giant of the 17th century, had a similar childhood.

Christmas. The exact timing of Jesus's birth is highly uncertain. Neither the day, month, or year is known. Early Christians may have favored a day near the winter solstice, because that signifies the seasonal rebirth of the Sun's gifts (warmth and light). And some Christians celebrate January 6; that seems to be the origin of the “12 days of Christmas.” Some astronomers have tried to find an astronomical event (planetary conjunction, nova, comet, etc.) around that time, and link it to the story of the Magi “who saw a star in the east.” But none of those events occur in the year zero (most are in the range 2-6 CE). Also, it’s hard to understand how an astronomical sighting can indicate a particular 

 on Earth—as stated in the Matthew gospel, the only source for the story. Everything in the sky 

Johannes Kepler was born on this day in 1571. Kepler's derivation of the precise orbit of planets (ellipses) was the first to establish that the planets moved in a precise geometric pattern. Arthur Koestler wrote a great popular book about Kepler—

It was part of an equally great popular book about the Scientific Revolution—

First quarter Moon—close to Jupiter in tonight's evening sky.

December Big Apple Sky

Big Apple Sky Calendar: December 2022

First quarter moon. In tonight's sky, the bright yellow object just NW of the Moon is Saturn.

End of Daylight Savings Time. At 2 am EDT, wake up and set your clocks back to 1 am…except in Hawaii and Arizona, which do not participate in Daylight Savings Time.

Birthday of Marie Curie (nee Sklodowska) in Warsaw in 1867. The only person ever to win Nobel Prizes in different fields (1903 Physics, 1911 Chemistry).

In this morning's sky, all USA observers will see a 

A few minutes after the partial phase begins (4:10 am), you might see a little nick taken out of the Moon's side. Over the next hour, that nick—the Earth's shadow—grows to cover the entire Moon. The total eclipse begins at 5:17 and ends at 6:42 am. During totality, you'll probably notice a reddish tinge to the remaining faint moonlight. This is sometimes called the Blood Moon (ooooooo……), and it comes from sunlight that has reached the Moon after getting refracted around the edge of the Earth. Thus lunar residents, looking back at Earth, would see a faint reddish circle around the darkened Earth's periphery. Some total lunar eclipses are bloodier than others (any guesses why?; no one knows, so your guesses are safe). I've seen some that are deep red, some just a faint gray, and one where the Moon disappeared entirely (to the eye) during the total phase.

By the way, pay no attention to any times you see listed for the “penumbral eclipse.” A penumbral eclipse is when the Moon is still fully illuminated, but by a slightly dimmer light.  You won't notice the difference; it's like reading by a 60-watt rather than a 100-watt bulb.

But here's a big problem. For New Yorkers, all of this occurs in the early morning hours, when the Moon appears quite low in the west. City lights might bother you a little, but BUILDINGS are an absolute scene-wrecker. Pardon me for being obvious, but you need to see the Moon…and therefore need a clear view to the west, as near to the horizon as you can manage. (Actually, the Brooklyn waterfront should be pretty good.)

Half the Earth—the side facing the Moon—will see the eclipse. That's true of all lunar eclipses. But far less than half of 