March 27
The Barker in the Fields
Sun Position
The Sun is in Aries at roughly +5° declination; Northern Hemisphere days are lengthening by about two minutes each, and the Southern Hemisphere's approach to winter is now gradual but consistent.
Sky Highlight
Virgo is high in the southeastern sky by late evening in late March, and the Virgo Cluster of galaxies is now well-placed for spring observing. The cluster's nearest edge is about 50 million light-years away; scanning with binoculars in this region of the sky will pick up fuzzy patches of light that are each an entire galaxy.
Deep Sky Object
M58 (NGC 4579), a barred spiral galaxy in Virgo, about 62 million light-years away, one of the brightest Messier galaxies and one of the most prominent spirals in the Virgo Cluster; it has hosted two confirmed supernovae (1988 and 1989). Visible from both hemispheres in spring.
Featured Star
Auva (δ Vir) is a red giant 202 light-years away, spectral class M3III, and a slow irregular variable, its brightness shifts unpredictably as its outer atmosphere pulses with no clean period. 'Auva' is one of several Arabic names connected to a word meaning the barker or howler, placing this star in an ancient southern sky pattern now absorbed into Virgo.
Around This Date
- March 27, 1969Mariner 7 launched toward Mars, where it and its twin Mariner 6 would make the first dual-spacecraft flyby of another planet later that year, returning hundreds of images of the Martian surface.
- March 28, 1802Heinrich Olbers discovered the asteroid Pallas, the third-largest object in the asteroid belt, just over a year after Ceres was found, revealing for the first time that more than one such body orbited the Sun between Mars and Jupiter.
A variable red giant in the grain fields of Virgo, brightening and dimming on no fixed schedule, the sky's irregular timekeeper.