See the “Martian Triangle” in the Sky Tonight!

If — like me — you’ve been focusing on all the great images and news coming from the Mars Science Laboratory, perhaps you’ve missed the great view of the “Martian Triangle,” now visible in the night sky at twilight! Astrophotographer John Chumack hasn’t missed the view. This image is from August 6, 2012 from his observatory in Yellow Springs, Ohio.

The Martian Triangle show starts at twilight, and you can find it by looking low in the southwestern sky. The star at the top is actually the planet Saturn, the star on the bottom left is Spica, and the bright spot on bottom right is the planet Mars. And remember, somewhere in your field of view, there’s a few spacecraft on and around Mars and another orbiting Saturn.

John took this image with a modified Canon Rebel Xsi DSLR and a 47mm Lens, at F5.6, ISO 800, 10 second exposure. See more of John’s wonderful astrophotos at his Flickr page or at his website, Galactic Images.

Want to get your astrophoto featured on Universe Today? Join our Flickr group or send us your images by email (this means you’re giving us permission to post them). Please explain what’s in the picture, when you took it, the equipment you used, etc.

Nancy Atkinson

Nancy has been with Universe Today since 2004, and has published over 6,000 articles on space exploration, astronomy, science and technology. She is the author of two books: "Eight Years to the Moon: the History of the Apollo Missions," (2019) which shares the stories of 60 engineers and scientists who worked behind the scenes to make landing on the Moon possible; and "Incredible Stories from Space: A Behind-the-Scenes Look at the Missions Changing Our View of the Cosmos" (2016) tells the stories of those who work on NASA's robotic missions to explore the Solar System and beyond. Follow Nancy on Twitter at https://twitter.com/Nancy_A and and Instagram at and https://www.instagram.com/nancyatkinson_ut/

Recent Posts

You Can Build a Home Radio Telescope to Detect Clouds of Hydrogen in the Milky Way

If I ask you to picture a radio telescope, you probably imagine a large dish…

16 mins ago

A Space Walking Robot Could Build a Giant Telescope in Space

The Hubble Space Telescope was carried to space inside the space shuttle Discovery and then…

1 day ago

New Report Details What Happened to the Arecibo Observatory

In 1963, the Arecibo Observatory became operational on the island of Puerto Rico. Measuring 305…

2 days ago

We Understand Rotating Black Holes Even Less Than We Thought

The theory of black holes has several mathematical oddities. Recent research shows our understanding of…

2 days ago

Habitable Worlds are Found in Safe Places

When we think of exoplanets that may be able to support life, we hone in…

2 days ago

New Glenn Booster Moves to Launch Complex 36

Nine years ago, Blue Origin revealed the plans for their New Glenn rocket, a heavy-lift…

2 days ago