View the crescent Moon, Venus, Jupiter and The Pleiades tonight in the West.

The Moon passing close by to Venus, Jupiter and The Pleiades tonight.After sunset we have another astronomical treat in store. The crescent Moon will be just to the left of Venus tonight and below those will be Jupiter – and as an extra special treat The Pleiades will be right above them all. The Pleiades is also known as “the Seven Sisters” – and it’s often confused with “the Little Dipper”. That’s because it does look a lot like people expect the little dipper would – but that is a much bigger object and hangs out in a completely different part of the sky (in the North).

Spectacular visible pass of the International Space Station tonight! (Mar 2)

The International Space StationThe International Space Station will be a special treat for all of us in Southern California Tonight (March 2nd 2012).

For those of you who may be new to viewing it the ISS will be visible as one of the brightest (mostly the brightest) star-like object in the sky as it passes approximately 200 miles overhead at over 17000 mph.

Tonight the Space Station will be about the brightest it can theoretically be as it rises in the North West at 6:20pm and heads nearly overhead in the North East by 6:23pm and then sets over in the South East by 6:25pm.    So… it will be visible for a full 6 minutes or so.

Remember to wave to the 6 astronauts who are up there right now.

Click on the date for each pass for further detail on this visible pass of the ISS.

Date Mag Starts Max. altitude Ends
Time Alt. Az. Time Alt. Az. Time Alt. Az.
2 Mar -3.4 18:20:12 10 NW 18:23:18 65 NE 18:26:23 10 SE

All of the predictions above provided by Heavens-Above.com where you can get your own predictions for this and many other neat things to see in the sky above you.

Posted in ISS