Astronomy

One of the big advantages of living in a place like Larned is that the dark night skies can make astronomy a much more productive hobby.

The tool shown above (like the identical one on the main page of the More section of this site) accesses the computers of the U.S. Naval Observatory in Washington, D.C. The results shown are for the latitude and longitude of Larned, Kansas (38.18° N., 99.101° W.) and have been adjusted to local time (CST in the winter, CDT in the summer). You'll see the results for the next week. All of the variables have been entered for you. All you need to do is choose the celestial object (Sun, Moon, planet, or major star).

The results will be in a table format with three main columns: rise, transit, and set.

For rise and set, you'll see the date, hour (24-hour clock) and minute and then the azimuth in degrees. The azimuth is the location on the horizon. 0° or 360° is north, 90° is east, 180° is south, 270° is west and numbers between those break each quadrant of the horizon into 90 degrees. Therefore, a rise with an azimuth of 135° is exactly in the southeast.

The middle major column is the transit. The transit is when the object crosses the meridian. The meridian is the (imaginary) line that connects the point on the horizon due south of you with the zenith (the point in the sky straight overhead). The meridian continues to the north horizon, but that's not going to matter on most of the objects listed. After the day, hour and minute of the transit is the altitude shown in degrees and direction. Usually the direction is S for south. If, for example, the transit is at 21:30 and the altitude is 45S, that means you can go outside at 9:30 p.m., face due south and then go up 45° and you'll see the object right there. The zenith (straight overhead) is 90°, so the object would be halfway from the horizon to the zenith.

More astronomy links:
(These sites are frequently updated telling you what is in the sky now.)

Sky Maps (Astronomy for Kids)
The Sky This Week (from the Naval Observatory)

Explore the rest of our web site

Write to the webmaster.

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