By Erich Karkoschka
Mercury has its best morning apparition starting on the 17th. During the last week of October it will be easily visible just before 6 am looking east.
Venus is finally becoming a brilliant evening “star”. All month it sets at 8:10 pm. It speeds past Antares on the 16th at 1 1/2 degrees distance. On the 29th, it is in greatest elongation from the sun at 47 degrees. It moves far south and thus sets further south of west than the sun does in December.
The Moon will be a thin crescent at dusk on the 7th. Two days later it will make a beautiful pair with Venus.
Jupiter and Saturn transit halfway up mid evening. They stop their retrograde motion and move prograde again in Capricornus. They reach their closest separation of 15 degrees at the end of the month. The next time they will be that close will be in 2040. Mondays will be the days to look for Ganymede’s shadow on Jupiter’s disk, on the 11th until 7:30 pm, on the 18th from 8-11:30 pm, just after Io’s shadow entered at 11:15 pm, and on the 25th starting just before midnight. A double transit will occur on the 20th until 8 pm with Io’s shadow and Callisto itself.
