“Jupiter at its Closest, Biggest and Brightest This Week! Plus, Don't Forget National Astronomy Day this Saturday!”

Scheduled air date: 2006 May 01-07

National Astronomy Day is celebrated on Saturday, May 6th. On that night, many observatories, planetariums and astronomy clubs will offer free telescope viewing. As the giant planet Jupiter is at opposition—directly opposite the Sun as seen from Earth—this same weekend, it will be prominently featured.
(Shown about two hours after sunset on the night of May 6th for mid-northern latitudes. The inset shows the locations of Jupiter's four Galilean moons at 10:00 PM MDT.)

If you wish to view illustrations for other episodes, please see our Star Gazer Illustrated directory.

Illustrations on this page were created using TheSky6 Astronomy Software, an advanced desktop planetarium program designed for Windows. Copyright © 1999-2006 by Software Bisque, Inc.