STAR GAZER
Episode # 08-50 / 1619th Show
To Be Aired : Monday 12/15/2008 through Sunday 12/21/2008
"The So-Called "Christmas Star" Returns
Accompanied By A Companion!"

Horkheimer: Greetings, greetings fellow star gazers. Every few years during the Christmas season an extremely bright star-like object appears in early evening, which prompts many people to ask, "is it the Christmas Star?" And once again it has returned for the holiday season and is the brightest object we can see in the nighttime sky second only to the Moon. But this year it has returned with a companion, which is the third brightest object we can ever see in the nighttime sky. Let me explain.

O.K., we've got out our skies set up for any night during Christmas week about 45 minutes after sunset facing southwest where the brightest object you'll see will be the so-called Christmas Star. And down to its right a not quite as bright star-like object, a companion to the so-called Christmas Star. But even though both of them look like incredibly brilliant stars nothing could be farther from the truth. In fact they are much closer than any star other than our Sun. In fact they are part of our Sun's family, two planets. The one closest to the horizon is the king of the planets itself, Jupiter.

And if you get a small telescope for Christmas you'll be absolutely fascinated at the detail you can see. You'll be able to make out horizontal lines, which are bands of huge gigantic storms, which continually encircle this planet. And you'll also see tiny pinpoints of light lined up on either side of Jupiter, which are its four largest moons. Plus if you go out hour after hour night after night you'll notice that they constantly change their position in relation to Jupiter and each other. And that is because they are constantly moving in orbit around it. So that's the story behind this year's Christmas Star's companion.

The so-called Christmas Star is also a planet, the most reflective planet of them all because it is constantly enshrouded by a dense cloud cover, which makes this planet act like a giant mirror. It is our nearest neighbor in space other than the Moon, Venus. And for centuries whenever Venus has made its appearance during the Christmas season, people have mistaken it for the star mentioned in the Christmas story. And if you look at it through a small telescope you will see that it goes through phases just like our Moon. In fact during Christmas week this year it will look like a just past first quarter Moon.

Now Venus which is almost the same size as our Earth, is much smaller than Jupiter, only 8,000 miles wide whereas Jupiter is 88,000 miles wide which means we could line up eleven Venuses across its middle which tells us that it must be super close to be so much brighter than Jupiter. How close you ask? Well all during Christmas week Venus will be only 78 million miles away from earth but Jupiter will be a whopping seven times farther away, 558 million miles beyond. Which may lead you to ask, "If Jupiter were as close to Earth as Venus, how bright would it be in our night sky?" Answer: 50 times brighter! So bright we'd see it every day in the daytime sky. So get thee out all during Christmas week just after sunset and enjoy the beauty of the two brightest planets in our solar system. And see if they don't make your holiday just a little bit brighter. Keep looking up!