{"id":597995,"date":"2026-09-12T10:08:09","date_gmt":"2026-09-12T10:08:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/597995\/"},"modified":"2026-09-12T10:08:09","modified_gmt":"2026-09-12T10:08:09","slug":"the-sky-today-on-saturday-september-12-dione-skims-saturns-pole","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/597995\/","title":{"rendered":"The Sky Today on\u00a0Saturday, September 12: Dione skims Saturn\u2019s pole"},"content":{"rendered":"

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

\n\t\t\t\tDione crosses Saturn\u2019s north pole, projecting its shadow onto the cloud tops as Tethys disappears into the planet\u2019s shadow.\t\t\t<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

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

\n\t\t\t\t\t\tEarly on Sept. 12, Dione is preparing to skim Saturn\u2019s north pole as Tethys is about to disappear into the planet\u2019s shadow. Mimas, although shown, is 13th magnitude and too faint for many scopes. Note that Iapetus is some 2′ north of Saturn at this time, outside this field of view. Credit: Astronomy: Roen Kelly\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n

Looking for a sky event this week? Check out our full\u00a0Sky This Week<\/a>\u00a0column.\u00a0<\/p>\n

September 11: Visit the Deer Lick Group<\/a><\/p>\n

Saturn dominates the southern sky in the early hours after midnight. It\u2019s the brightest point of light here, standing some 50\u00b0 high around 2 A.M. local daylight time. In addition to its biggest and brightest moon, mid-8th-magnitude Titan, 10th-magnitude Rhea, Tethys, and Dione are also often visible through a telescope, hugging the planet as they orbit closer in than Titan.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Dione skims Saturn\u2019s north pole early this morning starting around 2:55 A.M. EDT (the 12th in all U.S. time zones except Pacific, where it is just before midnight, late on the 11th). The moon is preceded by its small shadow, which appears on Saturn\u2019s northeastern limb just after 2 A.M. EDT. Dione itself tracks over the north pole for about 40 minutes, before moving off to the west around 3:35 A.M. EDT.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Shortly before Dione\u2019s transit starts, look near the southwestern limb of Saturn to find Tethys approaching from the west. It disappears before it ever meets the limb around 2:10 A.M. EDT, when it passes into Saturn\u2019s long, dark shadow, which extends beyond the planet to the southwest.\u00a0<\/p>\n

During this series of events, Rhea is visible to the planet\u2019s west with Titan beyond it, far to the west.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Sunrise: 6:38 A.M.
Sunset: 7:14 P.M.
Moonrise: 8:17 A.M.
Moonset: 7:47 P.M.
Moon Phase: Waxing crescent (5%)
*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.\u00a0<\/p>\n

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 Dione crosses Saturn\u2019s north pole, projecting its shadow onto the cloud tops as Tethys…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":597996,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[111,139,69,12839,147,62517],"class_list":["post-597995","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-tonight"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/597995","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=597995"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/597995\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/597996"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=597995"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=597995"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=597995"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}