June 8
White Pair in the Healer
Sun Position
The Sun is in Gemini, declination around +23°. Northern days are very long now; evenings give way to short, bright nights.
Sky Highlight
On June 8, 2004, the first Transit of Venus in 122 years occurred, and in 2012 another transit fell on June 5–6. While no transit is expected this year, June 8 marks one of the historically significant dates in planetary transit observation.
Deep Sky Object
M19 (NGC 6273), a globular cluster about 28,000 light-years away. M19 in Ophiuchus is one of the most oblate globular clusters in the Messier catalog, noticeably flattened in shape, likely due to its proximity to the dense gravitational field near the galactic center. Better from southern latitudes; northern observers see it low in the south in June and July evenings.
Featured Star
Sabik (η Oph) is a white main-sequence pair (A2V + A3V) about 88 light-years away in Ophiuchus, two nearly equal white suns orbiting each other, calm and close in the body of the serpent-bearer. The name, from Arabic, simply marks its place in the figure: the one that precedes.
Around This Date
- June 8, 2004The Transit of Venus was observed globally for the first time since 1882, with millions watching online or through solar filters as Venus crossed the Sun's disk over roughly six hours.
- June 8, 1783The Laki volcanic fissure in Iceland began an eight-month eruption that killed over 9,000 people directly and triggered a sulfurous haze across Europe that dimmed the Sun for months, an atmospheric event documented by astronomers and linked by Benjamin Franklin to the unusually cold winter of 1783–84.
Two stars, one name, 88 light-years out, the sky simplifies what is actually double.