All articles tagged with #pleiades
As nights lengthen this autumn, the sky offers a sequence of highlights: the bright Pleiades cluster, the Orionid meteor shower in October, a mid‑November planetary parade featuring Mercury, Venus, Mars and Jupiter, the fast Leonid meteors later in November, and November’s Beaver Moon that will reach supermoon status, encouraging dark-sky watching when weather permits.
September 2026 offers a string of prime stargazing opportunities: Venus near Spica on Sept 1–2, a Diamond Moon visible alongside the Pleiades on Sept 3 (and again near Sept 30), a modest Epsilon Perseids meteor shower on Sept 9–10, Venus at its brightest around Sept 22, the Sept 23 equinox signaling the change of seasons, Neptune at opposition on Sept 26 for a favorable telescope view, and the Harvest Moon closing out the month.
An amateur astrophotographer, Mark Germani, spent about 18 hours imaging the Pleiades open star cluster from Vancouver using an Askar SQA55 refractor and a UV/IR-cut filter. The resulting deep-space image shows dozens of blue-white stars amid surrounding blue reflection nebulas, a foreground dust veil the cluster is moving through. The Pleiades lies roughly 445 light-years away in Taurus and is nicknamed the "Seven Sisters" after its seven brightest stars.
Using Gaia data, researchers argue the Pleiades would have looked like seven distinct stars 100,000 years ago, offering a plausible origin for cross-cultural 'Seven Sisters' myths and suggesting oral traditions could preserve a single star-based story for up to about 4,000 generations, though the claim is inferential and not proven.
Space.com reports a 2:00 PM EDT (1800 GMT) livestream from The Virtual Telescope Project showing the waxing crescent Moon occulting the Pleiades (the Seven Sisters, Messier 45) on April 19; US viewers get a daytime occultation while Italian viewers can watch after sunset, with Earthshine illuminating the Moon’s dark edge as the pair pass about 445 light-years away.
Space.com guides stargazers to see the Pleiades before it vanishes in the spring glow, noting it’s best viewed October–March and will fade toward the horizon by late April; to locate it, use Orion’s Belt as a guide—extend a line from Alnitak through Mintaka past Aldebaran to find the hazy cluster; a pair of 10x50 binoculars or a small telescope reveals dozens of stars, including the seven brightest named after Atlas’s daughters.
Space.com reports a waxing crescent Moon will skim the Pleiades (the Seven Sisters) tonight and tomorrow (Mar. 22–23), visible in the western sky after sunset about five degrees from the cluster; look for Aldebaran and the Hyades nearby, with Venus near the horizon and Jupiter shining overhead in Gemini. By March 23 the Moon moves above the Pleiades, hinting at another night-sky highlight in the days ahead. A pair of binoculars or a small telescope helps reveal the cluster’s stars.
On Feb 25, 2026, the waxing gibbous Moon travels through Taurus between Aldebaran and the Hyades, high in the southern sky after dark, with brilliant Jupiter (mag -2.4) visible nearby and the Pleiades nearby as well; a telescope or binoculars enhances the view of this night-sky lineup as you watch the Moon glow in the Bull’s horns.
On Feb 23, the waxing gibbous Moon will glow near the Seven Sisters open star cluster (the Pleiades) in Taurus, making a striking pairing in the western sky. The Moon will sit within about 5 degrees of the cluster and can be viewing with binoculars or a small telescope; it will move past the Pleiades through the night and set a few hours after midnight for New York observers, though exact rise/set times vary by location—check Time and Date for precise timings.
After sunset on Jan. 27, the 76% lit Moon will sit about 5 degrees from the Pleiades open star cluster in Taurus, offering a chance to spot the Seven Sisters with binoculars. The Moon will drift away and set around 3 a.m. local time, making the view more challenging by nightfall’s end, so look to the southeastern sky with a clear, dark-site horizon to see Asterope, Alcyone, Celaeno, Electra, Merope, Maia and Taygeta.
The Nebra Sky Disc, a Bronze Age bronze and gold disk found in Nebra, Germany and dated to around 1600–1800 BCE, is regarded as the world’s oldest depiction of astronomical phenomena. Its gold inlays illustrate celestial features, including a cluster some interpret as the Pleiades, and its arcs may mark horizons and solstices; when aligned with the hill where it was buried, it likely functioned as an ancient sky calendar, though questions about its exact origin persist.
Astronaut Kimiya Yui captured a stunning timelapse video from the ISS showing zodiacal light, green auroras, and the Pleiades star cluster, highlighting the beauty of Earth's orbit and celestial phenomena.
Astronomers using NASA's TESS and ESA's Gaia have discovered that the Pleiades star cluster is about 20 times larger than previously thought, containing thousands of stars instead of just seven, which could reshape our understanding of star formation and the galaxy's structure.
On November 6, early morning skywatchers can see the nearly full moon near the Pleiades star cluster in the western sky before dawn, with binoculars enhancing the view of the Seven Sisters and nearby Uranus, offering a spectacular celestial event.
The moon will pass in front of the Pleiades star cluster on October 9, 2025, offering a rare opportunity for skywatchers in North America to observe the occultation, with specific viewing times and locations provided for optimal viewing, especially using telescopes.