Stars above the Coast astronomy column Feb. 14-20: the twin planets of Mardi Gras

PLANETS TO WATCH: If you have a clear view to the western horizon tonight through Wednesday, you should be able to see a conspicuous pairing of Venus and Jupiter, near the horizon in fading twilight.

Mars, still very bright, will be almost straight overhead about 11:15 p.m., while Saturn will be in the east at midnight. Mercury is lost to view for at present.

The best vision of the Venus-Jupiter pairing will be on Tuesday just as it gets dark. You'll need an open view to the west if you're downtown for the parades however.

THE MOON waxes from a tiny semi-circular at sunset tonight to nearly first quarter by the weekend. Evening stargazing should be usually good on clear nights.

THIS WEEK: If you're in the country and gone from light, you should have a good view of the Milky Way this week. About 8 p.m., you can outline it from southeast to northwest, and almost directly overhead.

Some of the brighter constellations in the galaxy's main trail comprise Canis Minor, Gemini, Auriga and Cassiopeia.

Under dark skies, a sweep of the Milky Way with binoculars is forever a striking experience.

DID YOU KNOW? Romantic sounding Venus is really a hostile place, with an acid atmosphere and temperatures of up to 800 degrees Fahrenheit.

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Red Planet Rising

Happy New Year everyone! I wish all a safe, healthy and prosperous 2010 as we come into the second decade of the 21st Century!

2009 was a great year for space exploration as space and water telescopes dominated. Water was proven to exist on the Mars and Moon and is thought to be present in moons of Jupiter and Saturn. Hubble Space Telescope was upgraded and repaired and NASA's planetary hunting space telescope Kepler and newest infrared space telescope WISE were launched. Much will be happening in space this year and you will be capable to read all about it right here.

Mercury comes into sight the third week of the new year in the morning sky 45 minutes or so before sunrise. Prime time for the planet will be from the 15th to 30th when it will be about a fist-width above the eastern horizon. To see Mercury you require an unobstructed view of the horizon.

NASA's MErcury Surface, Space ENvironment, GEochemistry, and Ranging (MESSENGER) spacecraft has given us the most complete coverage ever of the planet closest to the Sun.

Venus remains out of view as it is too close to the Sun to be seen, but will begin to be visible next month at sunset.

Mars will be in the eastern evening sky rising at about 7 p.m. and will be at its brightest for the next 2 years. The Red Planet will be nearby to Earth on January 27 at a distance of 61.7 million miles. This is a much farther closest approach distance compared to 2003 when Mars was about half that distance from earth. Mars is effortless to spot as it is a bright dull orange color. Use the nearly Full Moon, which will be to the right of Mars, on the January 2 and again on January 29 as a guide to discover the Red Planet.

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2009 – A year of triumph and tension for NASA!

The year 2009 was a mixed year of triumph and tension for NASA – while the agency triumphed in terms of captivating momentous steps towards exploration beyond the Earth’s orbit and also perking up its International Space Station research; tension for the agency consequence from the winding down of its shuttle program and the uncertainty hovering over the future direction of US human spaceflight.

With 2009 marking important achievements, like the discovery of water on the moon and Mars that would facilitate future of space exploration, and a class of newly-identified ‘Super-Earth’ planets that might some day turn out to be more habitable than Earth, the likely-to-be-stellar-studded coming year would see a growing armada of current, new and revived space telescopes.

Among the other highs for NASA this year was the go ahead by a White House panel to the growth of commercial space taxi services for US astronauts; the launch of five shuttle missions bythe agency ; the 40th anniversary of the Apollo 11 mission that was launched in July 16, 1969; the launch of a new generation of space telescopes for unraveling long-standing mysteries of outer space; and the spotting of distant galaxies by the 19-year-old Hubble telescope.

Commenting on the triumphs of 2009, William Gerstenmaier, associate administrator for space operations at NASA, said: “This is a tremendous time in spaceflight. We've had a very victorious year, and we need to cherish that.”

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