The Canada-France-Hawaii Telescope will host their annual Winter Star Party after the Waimea Christmas Parade on Dec. 3. The Star Party, occurring at CFHT’s Waimea offices, begins at 7 p.m., after the parade ends and continues until 10 p.m. Staff
The Canada-France-Hawaii Telescope will host their annual Winter Star Party after the Waimea Christmas Parade on Dec. 3. The Star Party, occurring at CFHT’s Waimea offices, begins at 7 p.m., after the parade ends and continues until 10 p.m. Staff and members of the West Hawaii astronomy club will set telescopes on the CFHT front lawn for community members.
Inside the building, visitors can participate in a whole set of family activities. Participants can peer into CFHT’s remote observing room and watch staff take real-time remote observations or ask an astronomer all their burning astronomical questions.
The youngest visitors can stop by the keiki booth and make a take-home holiday craft. The observatory will offer winter refreshments: hot chocolate, coffee and a s’mores fire pit. Visitors can register to win a ticket package for a family of four to the ‘Imiloa Astronomy Center in Hilo.
The December sky is ideal for stargazing. Early in the month, Orion will rise in the east around 7:30 p.m. By the end of the month, he will be visible as soon as the sun sets. Look for the famous Belt of Orion, a line of three fairly bright stars, rising near vertically. To the north of the belt, in Orion’s shoulder, is the bright red star Betelgeuse. This star is a red supergiant; a star near the end of its life. In fact, it is possible that Betelgeuse’s life has already ended in a colossal supernova explosion, but due to the finite speed of light and the incredible vastness of the universe, it still appears whole in the skies of Earth.
Preceding Orion in the sky is the beautiful star cluster of the Pleiades. This open star cluster can be found by lining up Betelgeuse with the star Aldebaran, the glowing red eye of Taurus the Bull. If you continue this line past Aldebaran, it will lead you to the Pleiades. This star cluster is well known around the world. In Hawaii it is called Makali’i, a name which has been variously interpreted as “Little Eyes,” “Little Stars,” “High-Born Stars” and “Eyes of the Chief.”
The stars of Orion, Taurus and the Pleiades are all observable at the time of the Star Party
December also hosts what is roundly described as the best meteor shower of the year: the Geminids. Reaching rates near 120 meteors per hour at its peak on the nights of Dec. 13 and 14, the Geminids will wow … or at least they would if not for the Moon. Our bright Supermoon peaks on the night of the 14th, so many of the dimmer Geminids will be lost to the glare. This unfortunate timing will mean that this shower won’t be quite as good as years past. Still, the sheer quantity of meteors will mean that some will be able to outshine the Moon and light up the sky.
A second smaller shower is also visible this month. This shower, called the Ursids, produces only 5-10 meteors per hour and peaks on the nights of Dec. 21 and 22. The meteors will appear from Ursa Minor, also known as the Little Dipper.
The CFHT Winter Star Party follows the 56th annual Waimea Christmas Parade which runs from 5:45-6:45 p.m. The observatory encourages everyone to come up to Waimea on Dec. 3 to check out the holiday fun.
