FAS Starry Nights Podcast – September 2025
Starry Skies: What can we see in the night skies over East Dorset, Southern Wiltshire and West Hampshire during the month of September 2025.
Planets visible this month: Saturn is visible just to the left of the moon on the 7th – then look at Saturn in binoculars and just above and to the left is Neptune – a greeny-blue off-white disc. Jupiter and Venus are both visible in the east around 05:00. With binoculars, you should see the moons of Jupiter too. On the 19th Sept at around 12:51pm – an occultation of Venus by the moon will be visible.
Our Constellation of the Month is Pegasus — The Flying Horse. Pegasus is visible in the southern sky during September. It is one of the ‘original’ 48 Constellations identified by Ptolemy in the 2nd century., it’s also known as the Great Square of Pegasus. The star Epsilion Pegasi, or Enif, marks the muzzle of the horse. Enif 9s an orange supergiant about 690 light years from the Earth. Loop slightly up and right from Enif with binoculars and you can see M15, a marvellous globular cluster, discovered in 1746 by Jean-Dominique Maraldi and catalogued by Messier in 1764. Podcast by Mark Hardaker and Steve Tonkin of Fordingbridge Astronomers, first broadcast on Forest FM in September 2025.