{"id":57766,"date":"2025-10-03T06:21:05","date_gmt":"2025-10-03T06:21:05","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/57766\/"},"modified":"2025-10-03T06:21:05","modified_gmt":"2025-10-03T06:21:05","slug":"the-sky-today-on-friday-october-3-ceres-shines-in-cetus","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/57766\/","title":{"rendered":"The Sky Today on Friday, October 3: Ceres shines in Cetus"},"content":{"rendered":"

\t\t\tBack to Article List\t\t<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t\tNow at opposition, the largest body in the main belt is passing through Cetus\u2019 east-west line of four Phi stars, just north of Diphda. \t\t\t<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\"Path<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t\t\t\tCeres spends all month within a short distance of several bright stars, aiding in its identification. Credit: Astronomy: Roen Kelly\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n

Let\u2019s peer into Cetus the Whale to spot 1 Ceres this evening, one day past opposition and glowing at magnitude 7.6, within the reach of binoculars or any small scope.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Ceres is carving a slow path north of Diphda, Cetus\u2019 magnitude 2.0 beta star. Around 10 P.M. local daylight time, Diphda is roughly 20\u00b0 high in the southeast and Ceres lies just over 8\u00b0 north of this star. As you skim north of Diphda, you\u2019ll pass a chain of four 5th- to 6th-magnitude stars, strung roughly east to west. From west to east, these are Phi1, Phi2, Phi3, and Phi4 Ceti; Ceres is now just about 1\u00b0 due north of magnitude 5.4 Phi3.\u00a0<\/p>\n

You can use this same string of stars to chart Ceres\u2019 movement throughout the month, as it passes close to Phi2 on the 10th and hangs due south of Phi1 on the 18th.<\/p>\n

Sunrise:\u00a06:59 A.M.
Sunset:\u00a06:38 P.M.
Moonrise:\u00a05:00 P.M.
Moonset:\u00a02:40 A.M.
Moon Phase:\u00a0Waxing gibbous (85%)
*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 12 P.M. local time from the same location.<\/p>\n

For a look ahead at more upcoming sky events, check out our full\u00a0Sky This Week<\/a>\u00a0column.\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Back to Article List Now at opposition, the largest body in the main belt is passing through Cetus\u2019…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":57767,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[111,139,69,12839,147,20826],"class_list":["post-57766","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-science","tag-new-zealand","tag-newzealand","tag-nz","tag-observing","tag-science","tag-sky-today"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/57766","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=57766"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/57766\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/57767"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=57766"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=57766"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=57766"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}