What’s up in the sky?: Week of 03/29-04/04

(WHSV) - Can you believe it? Thursday is the first day of April and Easter is this Sunday. Let’s take a look at what’s up in the sky this week.

Adding Daylight

Over the next week, we will gain about 15 minutes of added daylight again. The rate at which we gain daylight this week will go down by 2 minutes from 2 hours and 29 minutes a day to 2 minutes and 27 seconds a day. By April 4th, the sun will rise before 7 am again at 6:55 am with sunset at 7:41 pm. The next time the sun will rise after 7 am will be on September 20th! We will have 12 hours and 46 minutes of daylight by April 4th with 11 hours and 14 minutes of darkness.

ISS Viewing (Most Viewable)

Date and Time	Time Visible	Maximum Height (Degrees above the horizon)	Direction it Appears	Direction it Disappears
Sat April 3, 8:57 pm	5 min	76°	appears above NW	disappears above ESE
Sun April 4, 8:10 pm	6 min	44°	appears above NW	disappears above ESE

Moon Phases & Next Full Moon:

Moon Phase	Date and Time
Third Quarter Moon	April 4th, 6:02 am
New Moon	April 11th, 10:30 pm
First Quarter Moon	April 20th, 2:58 am
Full Moon	April 26th, 11:31 pm

The next full moon is called the Pink Moon. The Pink Moon’s name comes from the pink blooms of a wildflower Phlox subulata. This will be the second of four consecutive super moons in 2021.

Interesting Events:

On March 30th, zodiacal light returns again after dusk. After evening twilight, the western sky will have a faint light for about half an hour. It will extend up to where Mars is located. We will have zodiacal light until April 11th when the new moon arrives. This will occur around 8 pm or later as we progress through the week.

On April 4th, Asteroid 9 Metis will be at opposition. The asteroid will be well lit by the sun during the night and can be seen in the constellation Virgo.