LYNCHBURG, Tenn. — A parade of planets, a new moon, a solar eclipse, and a meteor shower, that’s a lot for a single day astronomically speaking.
When you woke up this morning, six planets — Jupiter, Mercury, Mars, Uranus, Saturn, and Neptune — all lined up like a celestial parade in the sky. Astrologist believe that each planet possesses innate energy. For example, Jupiter is expansive. Mercury is a big communicator. Mars exudes fiery, action-oriented energy and strategic Saturn plans everything. And Uranus, well, it’s all about sudden change and revolution. Put that all together, and there’s a lot of transformative energy in the atmosphere — if you subscribe to such things.
If your social media feed has been full of solar eclipse chatter this week, here’s what Moore County astronomer Billy Hix wants you to know: yes, it’s real — and no, you won’t see a thing from your backyard.
Hix, a retired NASA researcher who spent nearly two decades at Marshall Space Flight Center, is professor emeritus at Motlow College, and founded the school’s TeachSTEM outreach program, talked to The Lynchburg Times to set the record straight on Wednesday’s celestial buzz — and to point local sky-watchers toward the event actually worth staying up for.
A total solar eclipse happens somewhere on Earth roughly once every 1.5 to 2 years, and August 12 is one of those days. This one carves a path of totality through Russia, Greenland and Iceland, with a partial eclipse visible in New England. In Lynchburg, Hix says, “you will notice nothing” — the moon’s shadow simply never crosses this part of the map.
Interestingly, two locals just happen to be in Iceland today — Lynchburg Veterinary Hospital’s Drs. Bryant and Wendy Morton are currently on a family vacation there with their sons, Bart and Alex. We spoke to Wendy who told us that they were preparing to view the eclipse around 11 a.m. this morning.
100 METEORS AN HOUR
The real local event is easier to miss in the noise: the Perseid meteor shower peaks late Wednesday night into the early hours of Thursday, August 13, with rates that can reach up to 100 meteors an hour. The Perseids happen in early August each year and form from debris from Comet Swift-Tuttle. Hix calls this “one of the best bets of the year” to catch a shooting star.
Conditions line up well for it. Wednesday is also a new moon, meaning no moonlight to wash out the sky — just the Summer Triangle overhead, anchored by Vega, Deneb and Altair, marking Lyra, Cygnus and Aquila. It’ll hang there until nearly December.
The bigger show comes in two weeks. August’s full moon — the Sturgeon Moon, named by Native American tribes for the season the Great Lakes’ giant fish were easiest to catch — reaches its fullest point August 28, but will look full to the eye by August 27.
That same night brings a deep partial lunar eclipse, with Earth’s shadow covering roughly 96 percent of the moon’s face. Hix pegs the start around 9:35 p.m. in Lynchburg, with peak darkness landing around 11:15 p.m.
“Fall is such a wonderful time to be outside,” Hix says. “Never forget to look up and enjoy the show above your head. It is the greatest show of all.” •
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