Actually, I think what you're looking at is Arcturus, the brightest star in the constellation Bootes. It is currently just rising over the mountains to the East. It does appear to twinkle in different colors due to the atmosphere and is easily confused with airplanes. Jupiter is nearly straight overhead with a bright yellowish color, slightly to the east and is the brightest object in that part of the sky. On Sun, 2004-03-28 at 21:25, J Waterreus wrote:
Patrick
Thanks for the information. I know that what we saw over Cascade Mountain wasn't Jupiter. This wasn't as bright as Jupiter, and it was closer to the mountain. My husband looked a few minutes ago, and it was still there. It seems like if it was anything man-made, it would have moved. I've never heard of a star that blinked different colors.
Dottie
Patrick Wiggins wrote:
Hi,
J Waterreus wrote:
My daughter and I just spent about 45 minutes in the front yard trying to figure out how to use our telescope.
Star parties are a great way to learn to use telescopes. UVAA does a number of public and private star parties in Utah Valley while SLAs does a bunch in SLC and at their observatory in Stansbury Park ( http://slas.ws/calendar.asp?list=Yes&Year=2004&StarParty=1 ).
Anyway, here's my question. We're in Orem. When we looked east, above Cascade Mountain, we saw a rather bright star-like object. When we looked at it through the binoculars, it appeared to be either yellow or white with flashing green and red lights. We assumed it had to be an airplane, but we continued to watch it for awhile. After 30 minutes, it had only moved slightly higher in the sky. It couldn't possibly have been an airplane, because it didn't get closer to us or move to the right or left. Does anyone have any idea what it might have been?
As for what you are seeing in the sky, the brightest star-like object in the east just now is Jupiter.
BTW, right now right under the Moon is Saturn. Really nice to see through a telescope.
Patrick
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