Star Gazing

As mentioned, I went star gazing at the Singapore Science Centre last Friday, 2 weeks ago.

We saw the stars through the largest telescope in town. Not only stars, but we can clearly see Jupiter and Venus too!

Jupiter is really the brightest in the sky. I'm sure all of us had encountered when we were younger, you saw the brightest thing in the sky and your parents/bf/gf/aunts/uncles said that the thing is the satellite.

So that night, I raised the question: How do we differentiate between satellite and Jupiter when we've been taught that both are so bright?

The answer is: Satellites do not reflect their own lights, so there is no way they are the brightest. Satellites are even dimmer than most stars during dark skies.

So all these years, I have been conned in believing that the satellite is the brightest thing, when all these while it was Jupiter. *tsk tsk*

And do you know that there are as many as 2000 stars that appear every night?
We can't really see it in Singapore because our skies are not as dark.

My prof suggested we go to Desaru/Nepal where the skies are darker, and that's where stars shine most!

Anyway, the star gazing thing is open to the public every Friday night for free at the Omni Theatre. As planets rotate, they take turns to appear. For all you know, next time you may be seeing Saturn with those visible circles surrounding it!

A pic below the dark sky


:)