Excellent chance to see the zodiacal light

These next few days offer skygazers an excellent chance to see the zodiacal light. From the Northern Hemisphere, late winter and early spring are great times to observe this elusive glow after sunset. It appears slightly fainter than the Milky Way, so you’ll need a clear moonless sky and an observing site located far from the city. The Moon stays out of the early evening sky through March 7.

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Sirius, a binary star and the brightest star in the night sky

Sirius is a binary star and the brightest star in the night sky. With a visual apparent magnitude of −1.46, it is almost twice as bright as Canopus, the next brightest star.
The binary system consists of a main-sequence star of spectral type A0, termed Sirius A, and a faint white dwarf companion of spectral type DA2, designated Sirius B. The distance between the two varies between 8.2 and 31.5 astronomical units as they orbit every 50 years.

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The winter Hexagon

One of the sky’s largest asterisms a recognizable pattern of stars separate from a constellation’s form occupies center stage on winter's evenings.

The Winter Hexagon is a collection of stars that make up a pattern in the sky. It's not an official constellation, but it is made up of the brightest stars of Gemini, Auriga, Taurus, Orion, Canis Major, and Canis Minor. It's also often called the Winter Circle.

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