This Week's Sky at a Glance, November 14 – 23

The faint interstellar comet moves higher before dawn (updated). Comet 3I/ATLAS is gaining altitude in the pre-dawn sky. As of November 20th it was still about 10th magnitude, averaging many visual estimates, a little brighter than expected. You'll need a telescope capable of detecting a small, roundish faint fuzzy about 30° high in the east-southeast shortly before the first sign of dawn. You'll probably need at least a 6-inch scope visually, or larger depending on your sky. At least there's no Moon. Plan to be all set up two hours before sunrise.

See Bob King's All Eyes on Interstellar Comet 3I/ATLAS. The deep (13th magnitude) finder chart there continues through the morning of November 25th as the comet approaches Eta Virginis. The much wider-field chart above that one, with stars only to 5th magnitude, runs well into December. But to use it you'll need to print it out large and use a millimeter ruler to interpolate the comet's very precise position for the date and time you plan to observe. The comet symbols there are plotted for 12:00 UT on the dates given. Better to follow King's advice and use a sky-charting program that downloads new-comet information.

Also see King's newer article Comet K1/ATLAS Crumbles, Interstellar Comet 3I/ATLAS Delights.

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FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 14

■ In tonight's sky, Vega is the brightest star shining in the west in early evening. Its little constellation Lyra extends to its left. Somewhat farther left, about a fist and a half at arm's length from Vega, is 3rd-magnitude Albireo, the beak of Cygnus. This is one of the finest and most colorful double stars for small telescopes.

Farther on in roughly the same direction you come to 3rd-magnitude Tarazed and, just a finger-width past Tarazed, 1st-magnitude Altair.

■ Down from Tarazed runs Aquila's dim backbone, along the Milky Way if you have a dark enough sky. This arrangement reminds me of the other Summer Triangle bird, Cygnus, whose neck and backbone also run along the Milky Way. Cygnus now flies high upper right of Aquila.

SATURDAY, NOVEMBER 15

■ Orion clears the eastern horizon by about 8 or 9 p.m. now, depending on how far east or west you live in your time zone. High above Orion shines orange Aldebaran. Above Aldebaran is the little Pleiades cluster, the size of your fingertip at arm's length. Far left of Aldebaran and the Pleiades shines bright Capella.

Once Orion is well up, Jupiter rises above the east-northeast horizon to shine through the rest of the night as it crosses the sky.

Then down below Orion, Sirius rises around 10 or 11 p.m. It's the second brightest point in the sky these nights after Jupiter. Sirius always follows two hours behind Orion. Or equivalently, one month behind Orion.

SUNDAY, NOVEMBER 16

■ The modest Leonid meteor shower should peak in the early hours of Monday morning. There will be no moonlight. Bundle up very warmly, get comfortable in a reclining lawn chair under an open sky, and be patient. Under excellent sky conditions, you might see a dozen Leonids per hour.

Also: The weak, the long-lasting Taurids are still ongoing. The Taurids are very sparse but are known for occasional bright fireballs.

■ Continue your skywatch into Monday's early dawn, look low in the east-southeast, and there's the thin crescent Moon with Spica a couple degrees above it or to its upper right. As twilight brightens, Spica disappears. But brighter Venus rises to glow nearly two fists lower left of the Moon.

MONDAY, NOVEMBER 17

■ After night arrives, the Great Square of Pegasus lies level very high in the south above brighter Saturn. A handy sky landmark to remember: The west (right-hand) side of the Great Square points far down toward 1st-magnitude Fomalhaut, about four fists below. The east side of the Square points down toward 2nd-magnitude Beta Ceti, not as far and not as directly. This year, Saturn shines between these lines.

■ Now descending farther: If you have a very good view down to a dark south horizon — and if you're not much farther north than roughly New York, Denver, or Madrid — picture an equilateral triangle with Fomalhaut and Beta Ceti as its top two corners. Near where the third corner would be (just a bit right of that point) is Alpha Phoenicis, or Ankaa, in the constellation Phoenix. It's magnitude 2.4, not very bright but the brightest thing in its area. It has a yellow-orange tint; check with binoculars. Have you ever identified any trace of the constellation Phoenix before?

TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 18

■ Find Fomalhaut again. Whenever Fomalhaut is "southing" (crossing the meridian due south, which it does around 7p.m. this week), the Pointers of the Big Dipper stand upright low due north, straight below Polaris.

And, the first stars of Orion are soon to rise above the east horizon (for viewers in the world's mid-northern latitudes). Starting with the rise of Bellatrix, it takes the seven stars of Orion's main figure a little more than an hour to clear the horizon.

WEDNESDAY NOVEMBER 19

■ Two faint fuzzies naked-eye: The Andromeda Galaxy (M31) and the Perseus Double Cluster are two of the most famous deep-sky objects. They're both cataloged as 4th magnitude, and in a fairly good sky you can see each with the unaided eye. Binoculars make them easier. They're located only 22° apart, very high toward the east early these evenings — to the right of Cassiopeia and closer below Cassiopeia, respectively.

But they look rather different, the more so the darker your sky. See for yourself; binoculars help.

THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 20

■ Cygnus, high in the west after dark, is one of the most Milky-Way-rich constellations, but it has a reputation as being poor in deep-sky objects. A fine exception is the open cluster M39 with a total magnitude of 4.6, located 9° east-northeast of Deneb. Star-hop to it from Deneb using Matt Wedel's Binocular Highlight article and chart in the November Sky & Telescope, page 43. From Deneb using your finderscope, go through the starry arrowhead that points to the little arc that points to M39, as marked on his chart.

■ New Moon (exact at 1:47 a.m. on this date EST).

FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 21

■ By about 8 p.m. Orion is clearing the eastern horizon, depending on how far east or west you live in your time zone.

Orion's tilt while rising depends on your latitude. If you live north of 33° N (Los Angeles, Atlanta, the Nile delta, Shanghai), Betelgeuse will be higher than Rigel. If you're south of 33°, Rigel will be the higher of the two just after they rise.

As the night goes on, however, Betelgeuse always gain the upper position as seen from anywhere in the Northern Hemisphere.

■ Vega is the brightest star high in the west these evenings. Its little constellation Lyra extends to its left, pointing as always to Altair, currently the brightest star in the southwest.

Three of Lyra's stars near Vega are interesting doubles. Barely above Vega is 4th-magnitude Epsilon Lyrae, the Double-Double. Epsilon forms one corner of a roughly equilateral triangle with Vega and Zeta Lyrae. The triangle is less than 2° on a side, hardly the width of your thumb at arm's length.

Binoculars easily resolve Epsilon. And a 4-inch telescope at 100× or more should, during good seeing, resolve each of Epsilon's wide components into a tight pair.

Zeta is also a double star for binoculars. It's much closer and tougher, but is plainly resolved in a telescope.

And Delta Lyrae, upper left of Zeta by a similar distance, is a much wider and easier binocular pair. Its stars are orange and blue. It's set in a sparse grouping of a few fainter stars known as Stephenson 1.

SATURDAY, NOVEMBER 22

■ We're two thirds of the way through fall, so Capella shines in the northeast as soon as the stars come out. Almost three fists left of it is the Pleiades cluster, the size of your fingertip at arm's length. Below the Pleiades is Aldebaran. Farther below Aldebaran, watch for Orion to rise.

And then keep watch on the horizon way below Capella, or as low as you can see in that direction, for Jupiter to rise.

SUNDAY, NOVEMBER 23

■ The bowl of the Little Dipper slowly swings down in the evening at this time of year, left or lower left of Polaris, which holds steady due north. Most of the Little Dipper is dim. The exceptions are Polaris (its handle-end) and Kochab (the lip of its bowl). Both are 2nd magnitude.

Around 10 or 11 p.m., depending on your longitude within your time zone, Kochab passes exactly below Polaris. They're 16° apart, about a fist and a half.

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This Week's Planet Roundup

Mercury and Mars are hidden in the glare of the Sun.

Venus (magnitude –3.9) rises in the east-southeast during dawn, an hour or less before sunrise. It's rising a little later every day.

Jupiter (magnitude –2.4, in eastern Gemini) rises in the east-northeast around 8 or 9 p.m. It dominates the eastern sky, then the southeast, as the night advances. Castor and Pollux shine upper left of it, then above it in the hours before dawn. By that time the three stand very high in the south — with Procyon below them and Orion much farther to their lower right.

Saturn (magnitude +0.9, at the Aquarius-Pisces border) is having exciting times. Find it as the brightest dot high in the southeast at nightfall, below the Great Square of Pegasus. It stands highest on the meridian (due south) in early evening.

Saturn's rings are now very nearly edge-on. They may look in a telescope like a long, very faint needle piercing the bright, distinctly oblate (flattened) globe. Their shadow on the planet is a stronger black line along the equator. This aspect of Saturn is a sight to remember and one we won't see again for another 15 years.

Update / correction: Earth will not cross Saturn's ring plane at this time. The rings' inclination to our line of sight will reach a minimum value of a mere 0.37° on November 23rd, then will start increasing again without Earth passing through their plane. The inclination will stay close to that value for many days.

Will the rings be so thin that they look invisible? That would leave Saturn as a bare oblate globe divided by a thin black line.

For more goings-on at Saturn during this busy time, including transits of big Titan's shadow across the globe, go to Bob King's See Saturn's Rings at Their Thinnest. He suggests putting an occulting bar in your eyepiece to hide the glary globe and help reveal the hairline rings — and maybe give you a rare chance to add inner Mimas to your log of Saturnian moons! Or at least Enceladus, which I repeatedly glimpsed in a 6-inch reflector during a previous thin-rings season.

King includes there a timetable of Mimas's greatest elongations that happen when Saturn is high in the dark for North America. You can find Enceladus's greatest elongations by playing with Sky & Telescope's interactive Saturn's Moons calculator: run the hours forward and backward to see when Enceladus ("E") is farthest out at a time when Saturn will be high in darkness for you.

Uranus (magnitude 5.6, in Taurus 4° south of the Pleiades) is well up by 8 p.m. At high power in a telescope it's a tiny but definitely non-stellar dot, 3.8 arcseconds wide. You'll need a detailed finder chart to identify it among similar-looking faint stars; turn to the November Sky & Telescope, page 49.

Neptune is a telescopic "star" of magnitude 7.8, a dim speck just 2.3 arcseconds wide 4° northeast of Saturn. For Neptune you'll need an even more detailed finder chart.

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All descriptions that relate to your horizon — including the words up, down, right, and left — are written for the world's mid-northern latitudes. Descriptions and graphics that also depend on longitude (mainly Moon positions) are for North America. Eastern Standard Time (EST) is Universal Time minus 5 hours. UT is also known as UTC, GMT, or Z time.

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Want to become a better astronomer? Learn your way around the constellations. They're the key to locating everything fainter and deeper to hunt with binoculars or a telescope.

This is an outdoor nature hobby. For a more detailed constellation guide covering the whole evening sky, use the big monthly map in the center of each issue of Sky & Telescope, the essential magazine of astronomy.

For the attitude every amateur astronomer needs, read Jennifer Willis's Modest Expectations Give Rise to Delight.

Once you get a telescope, to put it to good use you'll want a much more detailed, large-scale sky atlas (set of charts). The basic standard is the Pocket Sky Atlas, in either the original or Jumbo Edition. Both show all 30,000 stars to magnitude 7.6, and 1,500 deep-sky targets — star clusters, nebulae, and galaxies — to search out among them.

Next up is the larger and deeper Sky Atlas 2000.0, plotting stars to magnitude 8.5; nearly three times as many, as well as many more deep-sky objects. It's currently out of print, but maybe you can find one used.

The next up, once you know your way around well, are the even larger Interstellarum Deep-Sky Atlas (with 201,000+ stars to magnitude 9.5 and 14,000 deep-sky objects selected to be detectable by eye in very large amateur telescopes), and Uranometria 2000.0 (332,000 stars to mag 9.75, and 10,300 deep-sky objects).

And read How to Use a Star Chart with a Telescope. It applies just as much to charts on your phone or tablet (which many observers find more versatile) as to charts on paper.

You'll also want a good deep-sky guidebook. A beloved old classic is the three-volume Burnham's Celestial Handbook. It was my bedside reading for years. An impressive more modern one is the big Night Sky Observer's Guide set (2+ volumes) by Kepple and Sanner. The pinnacle for total astro-geeks is the new Annals of the Deep Sky series, currently at 11 volumes as it works its way forward through the constellations alphabetically. So far it's up to H.

Can computerized telescopes replace charts? Well, I used to say this:

"Not for beginners, I don't think, unless you prefer spending your time getting finicky technology to work rather than learning how to explore through the sky yourself. As Terence Dickinson and Alan Dyer say in their Backyard Astronomer's Guide, 'A full appreciation of the universe cannot come without developing the skills to find things in the sky and understanding how the sky works. This knowledge comes only by spending time under the stars with star maps in hand and a curious mind.' Without these, 'the sky never becomes a friendly place.' "

Well, things change. The technology has continued to improve and become more user-friendly — particularly with software that can now, amazingly, recognize any telescopic star field to determine exactly where the telescope is pointed — finally bypassing all imperfections in the mount, tripod, gears, bearings and other mechanics, or in the user's skill in setting up.

The latest revolution is the rise of small, imaging-only "smartscopes." These take advantage of not only today's pointing technology, but also the vastly better capabilities of imaging chips compared to the human retina. And, the most sophisticated image processing can come built in. The result is reasonably capable deep-sky imagers in shockingly small, low-priced units. The image is viewable on your phone or computer as it builds up. Small smartscopes can enable contributions to serious citizen-science projects.

These are changing the hobby at the entry level. For more on this revolution see Richard Wright's "The Rise of the Smart Telescopes" in the November 2025 Sky & Telescope, and read the magazine's review of this especially tiny one.

If you get a larger computerized scope that allows direct visual use, do make sure that its drives can be disengaged so you can swing it around and point it readily by hand when you want to, rather than only slowly by the electric motors (which eat batteries).

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Audio sky tour. Out under the evening sky with your
earbuds in place, listen to Kelly Beatty's monthly
podcast tour of the naked-eye heavens above. It's free.

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"The dangers of not thinking clearly are much greater now than ever before. It's not that there's something new in our way of thinking, it's that credulous and confused thinking can be much more lethal in ways it was never before."
            — Carl Sagan, 1996

"Facts are stubborn things; and whatever may be our wishes, our inclinations, or the dictates of our passion, they cannot alter the state of facts and evidence."
            — John Adams, 1770

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