It's more than one star - Alpha Centauri A, a Sun-like star, and its companion, the slightly less massive Alpha Centauri B, actually form a triple with Proxima Centauri (technically the nearest at just 4.22 light-years). The third brightest star in the night sky, Alpha Centauri is just 4.37 light-years away. One reason to visit the Southern Hemisphere is to see the star system closest to us. Here's a helpful tip: Take Sky & Telescope's 30°S planisphere with you in your travels to help you identify constellations. To southerners, it's a near-constant companion of Sirius, seen from October through May. Around 35° from Sirius is the second brightest star, Canopus, the Great Star of the South. Low on the northern horizon in the southern hemisphere summer, Orion's sword points up toward Rigel, while brilliant Sirius is overhead at zenith. The North Star, Polaris, isn’t visible and the circumpolar northern constellations, such as the Big Dipper, Cassiopeia, Draco, and Cepheus become seasonal.įinding the constellations and asterisms you thought you knew so well can be difficult: The Summer Triangle becomes the Winter Triangle down south, with Altair on top, and Deneb and Vega sinking as the night wears on. The first thing you'll notice after dusk south of the equator is that the northern constellations appear upside down. Here are a few reasons why you should visit southerly latitudes at least once in your life. You’ll see arguably some of the greatest celestial sights: the nearest stars to our solar system, two close dwarf galaxies, and some drop-dead gorgeous clusters. Yet the southern sky is disorientating, surprising, and utterly transfixing - well worth the trip if you can make it. Visiting the Southern Hemisphere just to go stargazing isn’t something most of us have the resources to do very often. If you regularly spend time with the night sky in the Northern Hemisphere but you've never travelled south of the equator, you only know half the story.
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