Still, it could be an interesting one to watch, and could be visible around the mid-U.S. Eastern seaboard if it goes off at sunset. It’s headed due east out of Wallops. nextspaceflight.com/launches/det...
Rocket Lab is launching an Electron rocket on a sub-orbital trajectory from NASA Wallops on the Virginia Coast tonight; the 5 hour launch window opens at 8:00 PM EDT. The ‘Bubbles’ mission looks to be a government (classified) payload, meaning there won’t be an official live webcast of the launch.
Here's a great image of Comet C/2025 R3 Pan-STARRS making waves on April 8th, courtesy of Dan Bartlett: www.astrobin.com/et5uvw/
Blue Bird track
Space-Track is listing Blue Bird-7 as IDs 68765/2026-085A, and the satellite is currently in a 265x 485 km orbit. We’ve got a series of early AM passes for the satellite for mid-northern latitudes this week:
AST Mobile
Blue Bird is part of the company’s new mega-sat constellation for direct smartphone connectivity. With a deployed phased-array antenna spanning 220 meters square, these will be especially prominent in LEO.
Blue Origin completed a launch of the company’s New Glenn rocket from the Cape yesterday; and while the launch and the first stage landing went well, the customer AST SpaceMobile’s Blue Bird-7 was placed in an off-nominal orbit. www.youtube.com/watch?v=9058...
Here’s our latest post on comet C/2025 R3 Pan-STARRS at perihelion and what to expect for Universe Today: www.universetoday.com/articles/com...
Comet R3 Pan-STARRS orbit.
Comet R3 Pan-STARRS enters SOHO’s field of view later this week on Thursday, April 23rd. The comet will get ejected from the solar system on its outbound leg, destined to become someone else’s ‘interstellar comet.’
Taken by Ujvárosi Beáta on April 18, 2026.
Credit: Mohammed Al-Ani
The comet of the hour, C/2025 R Pan-STARRS reached perihelion today at ~7:00 UT/3:00AM EDT, 0.499 AU(46.4 million mi) from the Sun , just exterior to the orbit of Mercury. Currently shining at magnitude +4, dedicated astros are still managing to nab the comet before it’s engulfed in the Sun’s glare.
An interesting read on the lunar 'flashes' seen by the Artemis 2 crew - via @skyandtelescope.bsky.social - skyandtelescope.org/astronomy-ne...
Finally, the New Moon actually photo-bombed NASA’s Solar Dynamics Observatory’s view of the Sun recently, producing a fleeting partial solar eclipse:
Moon v M45
Occultation footprint.
Follow that Moon, as it occults the Pleiades star cluster for the Siberian Arctic tomorrow night; the rest of us will see a close pairing worldwide. Gianluca Masi and the Virtual Telescope Project will carry the view live: www.virtualtelescope.eu/2026/03/24/t...
Venus is surprisingly easy to see in the daytime, once your eyes lock on to it. I’ve used it before to get an early star party start, pre-sunset. youtube.com/shorts/nhRuJ...
Stellarium.
Ever seen Venus… in the daytime? This weekend is a good time to try this unique feat of ‘visual athletics,’ using the nearby waxing crescent Moon as a guide. The +4% illuminated perigee Moon passes 4.6 degrees NNW of Venus tomorrow at 7:00UT. Here's tonight's dusk view:
Comet evolution.
Here's an amazing sequence showing the evolution of Comet C/2025 R3 Pan-STARRS from last Fall to this month, courtesy of Didac Mesa Romeu:
Certainly, grabbing the twin M74/M77 objects at dusk in mid-April will be tough, as we’re at the very edge of the Messier Marathon window in mid-April.
This works because the Sun’s position along the ecliptic in March/April sits in Pisces, while a majority of the objects in the catalog lie along the summer galactic plane. Good luck!
Messier Marathon
This also means this coming weekend is an ideal time for northern hemisphere observers to complete a Messier Marathon, and image/observe all of the 110 objects in 18th century astronomer Charles Messier’s deep-sky catalog in one night.
This is a tough catch, as the record stands at 11 hours and 40 minutes past New: www.universetoday.com/articles/ult...
Moonwatch.
Stellarium.
The Moon reached New Phase today at 11:53 UT/7:53 AM EDT, marking the start of Brown Lunation Number 1278.
U.S. East Coast observers have a shot at spotting an ultra-thin waxing crescent Moon, at just around ~12 hours past New.
DESI's 5-year survey turned up 47 million galaxies... 13 million more than planned: www.science.org/content/arti...
Eclipse ad.
This was in a brave era where shirtless, whisky-drinking astronomers chased eclipses to the ends of the Earth:
Eclipse station.
Totality.
Apparently, any images of the CME/comet taken by the expedition have yet to make their way online… still, the Lick Observatory’s windswept Chilean eclipse observing station looks pretty dramatic:
Sungrazer eclipse.
Though sungrazers have been seen near the eclipsed Sun before, later discussions raise the possibility that he caught sight of something almost as rare: a disconnected coronal mass ejection: ui.adsabs.harvard.edu/abs/1989SoPh... A small sungrazer was seen during the April 8th, 2024 eclipse:
A total solar eclipse occurred on this day 1893, spanning South America, the mid-Atlantic and western Africa: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solar_e...
Astronomer John Martin Schaeberle led an expedition to Chile to image and observe the eclipse. He also noted a comet very near the Sun during totality.
Interesting. SpaceX provided a 'drone's eye view' of this AM's booster landing, post Starlink launch:
Lyrids
The 2026 Lyrid meteors night are active from April 14th through April 30th with a peak set for the night of April 21st-22nd. The Lyrids typically top out at a zenithal hourly rate (ZHR) of 18-20 per hour.
Here’s our post on the shower for @universetoday.com - www.universetoday.com/articles/cat...
