A Leonids Star Field
20.11.2001

As meteor after meteor streaked across a moonless sky, photographers across the world snapped pictures of the 2001 Leonids Meteor Shower. Many recognized this as the best meteor shower they had ever seen. In fact, the 2001 Leonids was the most active meteor shower since the mid-1960s.

Epsilon Tauri: Star with Planet
26.01.2024

Epsilon Tauri lies 146 light-years away. A K-type red giant star, epsilon Tau is cooler than the Sun, but with about 13 times the solar radius it has nearly 100 times the solar luminosity.

A December Winter Night
28.12.2024

Orion seems to come up sideways, climbing over a distant mountain range in this deep skyscape. The wintry scene was captured from southern Poland on the northern hemisphere's long solstice night. Otherwise unseen nebulae hang in the sky, revealed by the camera modified to record red hydrogen-alpha light.

1999 Leonid Fireball
2.12.1999

Most Leonid meteoroids, the bits of comet debris which produce the annual Leonid meteor shower, range from a mere millimeter to a centimeter in diameter. Yet these cosmic grains of sand and gravel can put on quite a spectacular show. How can something so small generate so much light?

Point Reyes Milky Way
12.03.2022

Northern winter constellations and a long arc of the Milky Way are setting in this night skyscape looking toward the Pacific Ocean from Point Reyes on planet Earth's California coast. Sirius, alpha star of Canis Major, is prominent below the starry arc toward the left.

Zodiacal Night
10.04.2021

An intense band of zodiacal light is captured in this serene mountain and night skyscape from April 7. The panoramic view was recorded after three hours of hiking from a vantage looking west after sunset across the Pyrenees in southern France. At 2838 meters altitude, Mont Valier is the tallest peak near center.

Mojave Desert Fireball
17.12.2009

Monstrously bright, this fireball meteor lit up the Mojave Desert sky Monday morning, part of this year's impressive Geminid meteor shower. Seen toward the southwest over rock formations near Victorville, California, a more familiar celestial background was momentarily washed out by the meteor's flash.

Winter Hexagon over Manla Reservoir
23.01.2017

If you can find Orion, you might be able to find the Winter Hexagon. The Winter Hexagon involves some of the brightest stars visible, together forming a large and easily found pattern in the winter sky of Earth's northern hemisphere.

Conjunctions near Dawn
30.06.2012

Now shining in eastern skies at dawn, bright planets Venus and Jupiter join the Pleiades star cluster in this sea and sky scape, recorded earlier this week near Buenos Aires, Argentina. Venus dominates the scene that includes bright star Aldebaran just below and to the right.

Venus by the Lake
14.04.2007

Finding Venus in the night sky is not too hard these days. Now appearing as the evening star, Venus rules as the brightest celestial beacon in west just after sunset. And if you can find Venus tonight, you can also easily find the lovely Pleiades star cluster (aka M45) close by.