The Night Sky in November

Abstract

AT the beginning of the month, the duration of night (defined, as the interval from sunset to the following sunrise) is 14 4 hours, and at the end of the month 15-3 hours in the latitude of London. The moon is new on November 14d 4.11 and full on November 28d 16.2h U.T. Occupations of stars brighter than magnitude 5 occur on November 28.29, when x Tauri reappears at 17h 30.6, “and T Tauri disappears at 23h 48 14m and reappears at lh 0.2m. The planet Venus sets this month in the early evening, and at sunset is low in the south-west. Jupiter is in the same region of the sky, and on the evening of November 12 will be found about 2° above Venus. The near approach of these two bright objects factual conjunction takes place on November 13d 12h) will be well worth looking for at nightfall on November 12 and following with telescopic aid about midday on November 13. Mars is a morning star of magnitude about + 1.8. Saturn is above the horizon during the first part of the night; on November 15 it sets just before 1h. Watch may be kept on November 15–16 for a possible display of the Leonid meteors. This shower, the radiant point of which is at R.A. 10h Om, Elec 4.22°, is generally visible every November, but at epochs of every 33 years it yields, with some exceptions, an unusually brilliant display. The last great shower was due in 1932, but in Great Britain it failed to come up to expectations, though at one station in the United States as many as 240 meteors were observed in an hour. November 19-20 is the date of maximum of the Andromedids, a shower associated with the lost comet of Biela; the radiant of the shower is not far from the star y Andromedæ. (Near v Andromedæ may be seen, with the naked eye, a tiny, faint hazy patch which is the Andromeda nebula, distant 870,000 light years.) The light variations of Algol (P Persei) can be observed at about the following times: November 8d 2h, 10d 23h, 13d 19h, 28d 4h and December 1d 0h. 1m mid-November at about 22h, the constellations Cassiopeia, Perseus, Andromeda, Aries and Cetus are on or near the meridian, but the eastern half of the sky, rich in first magnitude stars and led by the Pleiades, will probably claim the observer's attention.