Kurt Thrust's favourite image of Saturn at Opposition 2023

 

Saturn and four of its moons imaged from the Jodrell Plank Observatory the United Kingdom's most easterly Observatory.  

Our good friend Kurt Thrust, astronomer by night and party boy by day, sent us this image of the ringed planet Saturn and its brighter moons, Dione, Tethys, Enceladus and Rhea. Saturn can be seen with the naked eye in the Northern Hemisphere night sky just about due south at midnight. It will look like a dull yellow star not too far above the horizon. A telescope providing a magnification of at least x30 will be required if you want to see the rings. Jupiter, the largest of the Solar System planets, is also visible in the night sky but much much brighter than Saturn. Look to the East to see it. Four of Jupiter's 'Galilean Moons' may be seen with binoculars as they move around their orbits. Galileo witnessed these moons with his very basic refractor telescope and based on these observations his contention that the Earth and all the planets orbit the Sun.