{"id":249045,"date":"2025-12-24T09:46:08","date_gmt":"2025-12-24T09:46:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/249045\/"},"modified":"2025-12-24T09:46:08","modified_gmt":"2025-12-24T09:46:08","slug":"ceres-makes-us-see-double","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/249045\/","title":{"rendered":"Ceres makes us see double"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>\t\t\tBack to Article List\t\t<\/p>\n<p>\n\t\t\t\tDwarf planet Ceres passes close to a background star in Cetus tonight, creating a temporary, one-night-only \u201cdouble star.\u201d \t\t\t<\/p>\n<p><\/p>\n<p>\t\t\t\t<img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"620\" height=\"424\" src=\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/ASY-SM1225_01.png\" class=\"attachment-large size-large wp-post-image\" alt=\"Path of Ceres in December 2025\"\/><\/p>\n<p>\n\t\t\t\t\t\tCeres remains close to Iota Ceti all month, tracing out a path that should be relatively easy to follow. Credit: Astronomy: Roen Kelly\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>The article details an observation opportunity for dwarf planet 1 Ceres, which will appear at 9th magnitude within the constellation Cetus.<\/li>\n<li>Ceres will form a temporary optical double system with a background star, observable around 8 P.M. local time.<\/li>\n<li>Specific navigational instructions are provided, locating Ceres 4.4\u00b0 northeast of Iota Ceti and 2 arcminutes north of the 7th-magnitude star HD 3126 (HIP 2710).<\/li>\n<li>Accompanying astronomical data includes sunrise, sunset, moonrise, moonset times, and the Moon&#8217;s phase as a 24% waxing crescent for a specified location.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p class=\"has-text-align-center\"><strong>Looking for a sky event this week? Check out our full\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.astronomy.com\/observing\/the-sky-this-week-from-december-19-to-26-2025\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Sky This Week<\/a>\u00a0column.\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n<p class=\"has-text-align-center\"><strong>December 23: <a href=\"https:\/\/www.astronomy.com\/observing\/the-sky-today-tuesday-december-23-2025\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Comet Schaumasse closes in on the Virgo Cluster<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Dominating the main belt, dwarf planet 1 Ceres now shines at 9th magnitude in Cetus the Whale. The small dot is passing close to a background star this evening, appearing as one component in a temporary double system you can enjoy for one night only.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Ceres is located about 4.4\u00b0 northeast of magnitude 3.6 Iota (\u03b9) Ceti, which itself stands to the upper right of brighter magnitude 2.0 Diphda (Beta [\u03b2] Cet) in the south around 8 P.M. local time. Once you\u2019ve found Iota, skim slowly northeast with binoculars or a telescope, looking for a 7th-magnitude star. This is HD 3126 (also cataloged as HIP\u00a02710) \u2014 it may even be in your go-to scope\u2019s stellar library, allowing you to zoom right over with the push of a button. Once there, Ceres is the fainter spot just 2\u2019 north of this star.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p><strong>Sunrise:<\/strong>\u00a07:20 A.M.<br \/><strong>Sunset:<\/strong>\u00a04:40 P.M.<br \/><strong>Moonrise:<\/strong>\u00a010:29 A.M.<br \/><strong>Moonset:<\/strong>\u00a09:17 P.M.\u00a0<br \/><strong>Moon Phase:<\/strong>\u00a0Waxing crescent (24%)<br \/>*Times for sunrise, sunset, moonrise, and moonset are given in local time from 40\u00b0 N 90\u00b0 W. The Moon\u2019s illumination is given at 10 P.M. local time from the same location.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Back to Article List Dwarf planet Ceres passes close to a background star in Cetus tonight, creating a&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":249046,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[77],"tags":[18,19,17,2209,133,75779],"class_list":{"0":"post-249045","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-science","8":"tag-eire","9":"tag-ie","10":"tag-ireland","11":"tag-observing","12":"tag-science","13":"tag-sky-tonight"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@ie\/115773911294357198","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/249045","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=249045"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/249045\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/249046"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=249045"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=249045"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=249045"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}