Centaurus Astronomical Society

Occultation & Minor Planets

Minor planet Vesta has been progressing past Aldebaran in Taurus and has just started making its retrograde step which will last till early January. During this time this asteroid is at it brightest and an even easier object for binoculars than normally. Its magnitude for the rest of October, November and December will be better than magnitude 7 and will be fun to follow. Late November till early December it even reaches magnitude 6.5 which at some real dark sky sites could be called near the limit of naked eye visibility! But I would try 7x35 or 10x50 binoculars. A finder chart is attached, showing the constellation Taurus near the reddish star Aldebaran.

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Jovian Satellites Why Observer Them? To find out more read the article by Col in Volume 1 Issue 6 Newsletter. Also available are the Jovian Satellites Eclipse Predictions 2001