Astronomy questions ??

S

Scotland

New member
I have been looking at the night sky for a few hours now in my country. I live in ireland, co.roscommon.

I was trying to find jupiter and i was told i could find it next to the moon, which was at east location.

Was that the right location to find it. It wasent flickering in and it was the brightest object in the sky.

Also, how can you tell the difference between a star and a planet.

THX...
 
If you have a pair of binoculars, you can see Jupiter's moons, to the lower right at the moment. You would need a filter to be able to see that it's a planet because it's pretty bright, but it's very round, unlike a star which is a bright dot. Some polarized sunglasses might help.
 
You got it right.
Planets have a large enough disk so that any air disturbance will not have the same effect that happens to a beam of light from a star. As a result, most times planets don't twinkle. Stars do unless the air is calm.
If you look at a planet over many nights, sometimes weeks, it will move against the background stars.
 
If you have a pair of binoculars, you can see Jupiter's moons, to the lower right at the moment. You would need a filter to be able to see that it's a planet because it's pretty bright, but it's very round, unlike a star which is a bright dot. Some polarized sunglasses might help.
 
If you have a pair of binoculars, you can see Jupiter's moons, to the lower right at the moment. You would need a filter to be able to see that it's a planet because it's pretty bright, but it's very round, unlike a star which is a bright dot. Some polarized sunglasses might help.
 
If you have a pair of binoculars, you can see Jupiter's moons, to the lower right at the moment. You would need a filter to be able to see that it's a planet because it's pretty bright, but it's very round, unlike a star which is a bright dot. Some polarized sunglasses might help.
 
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