{"id":565653,"date":"2026-07-24T08:54:19","date_gmt":"2026-07-24T08:54:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/565653\/"},"modified":"2026-07-24T08:54:19","modified_gmt":"2026-07-24T08:54:19","slug":"the-sky-today-on-thursday-july-23-mercurys-retrograde-path-ends","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/565653\/","title":{"rendered":"The Sky Today on\u00a0Thursday, July 23: Mercury\u2019s retrograde path ends"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>\t\t\tBack to Article List\t\t<\/p>\n<p>\n\t\t\t\tThe solar system\u2019s smallest planet comes to a standstill this afternoon, ending its current retrograde path and beginning to move east.\t\t\t<\/p>\n<p><\/p>\n<p>\t\t\t\t<img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"1294\" height=\"903\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/1784883259_871_07232026.png\" class=\"attachment-large size-large wp-post-image\" alt=\"A simulated predawn sky looking east on July 23, 2026, 40 minutes before sunrise. Mars glows as an orange-red dot near the upper center of the frame, with the bright star Aldebaran visible to the upper right. Betelgeuse appears as a warm orange star in the lower right, and Mercury is labeled as a faint point low on the horizon to the lower left. The sky fades to a rich amber glow near the horizon.\"\/><\/p>\n<p>\n\t\t\t\t\t\tLook east before sunrise on the 23rd to see if you can spot tiny Mercury, not far above the horizon some 40 minutes before dawn breaks. Your best bet may be to look for the planet using binoculars, but make sure to put them away at least several minutes before sunrise from your location. Credit: Stellarium\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n<p class=\"has-text-align-center wp-block-paragraph\">Looking for a sky event this week? Check out our full\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.astronomy.com\/observing\/the-sky-this-week-from-july-17-to-24-2026\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Sky This Week<\/a>\u00a0column.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p class=\"has-text-align-center wp-block-paragraph\">July 22: <a href=\"https:\/\/www.astronomy.com\/observing\/the-sky-today-wednesday-july-22-2026\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Dione passes north of Saturn<\/a><\/p>\n<p class=\"has-text-align-left wp-block-paragraph\">The planet Mercury is stationary at 1 P.M. EDT. Located in the constellation Gemini, the tiny world is now rising before the Sun, visible for a short time in the east before sunrise. However, it\u2019s quite faint \u2014 magnitude 2.2 \u2014 and is best seen with binoculars or a telescope, to the far lower left of Betelgeuse in Orion, which itself stands left of the three star asterism Orion\u2019s Belt. High above, magnitude 1.3 Mars is brighter and easier to spot, to the left of Taurus\u2019 brightest star, Aldebaran.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Mercury is just 2\u00b0 above the horizon around 5:10 A.M. local daylight time, although it\u2019s rising. However, the sky is also brightening, so the earlier you can catch it, the better. A clear, flat horizon with no trees or buildings is best. Try using some optical aid to spot it, once you know you\u2019re in the right area (or simply use the go-to function on your scope if you have it). Through a telescope, Mercury is just 12% lit, which is why it\u2019s so faint despite its diameter of 10\u201d.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Now that Mercury has paused its motion in our sky, it will stop moving westward, or retrograde, and begin moving eastward, or prograde. In the coming weeks, it will head for the eastern border of Gemini and cross into Cancer around midday on August 8.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Sunrise: 5:51 A.M.<br \/>Sunset: 8:22 P.M.<br \/>Moonrise: 4:03 P.M.<br \/>Moonset: 12:38 A.M.<br \/>Moon Phase:\u00a0Waxing gibbous (75%)<br \/>*Times for sunrise, sunset, moonrise, and moonset are given in local time from 40\u00b0 N 90\u00b0 W. The Moon\u2019s illumination is given at 10 P.M. local time from the same location.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Alison Klesman\u00a0is senior editor of\u00a0Astronomy\u00a0magazine. She holds a Ph.D. in astronomy and has studied a variety of topics, from minor planets to supermassive black holes.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Back to Article List The solar system\u2019s smallest planet comes to a standstill this afternoon, ending its current&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":565654,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[23],"tags":[61,60,7882,82,44123,247],"class_list":["post-565653","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-space","tag-ie","tag-ireland","tag-observing","tag-science","tag-sky-tonight","tag-space"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/565653","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=565653"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/565653\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/565654"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=565653"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=565653"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=565653"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}