2021 Astronomical Calendar: Full Moons, Meteor Showers, and Eclipses to Watch for This Year Elizabeth Rhodes
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From the great conjunction to impressive comets, 2020 was filled with exciting astronomical events, but there’s even more on the horizon (and in the night sky) for 2021. This year, stargazers can look forward to meteor showers, lunar eclipses, supermoons, and even a total solar eclipse. To help you keep track of them all, we’ve created this astronomical calendar with some of 2021’s celestial highlights, thanks to information gathered from NASA, the American Meteor Society, and The Old Farmer’s Almanac.
Sky Shorts: Space exploration and night sky highlights for 2021
Suzie Dills
Although 2020 was a very difficult year for us, it gave us a chance to take time to observe astronomical highlights and night sky delights and view live broadcasts of historic launches. Many of us enjoyed the Great Conjunction of Jupiter and Saturn and the surprise visit of Comet NEOWISE. We watched the launch of the next Mars rover, Perseverance in July. History was made with the NASA SpaceX Crew Dragon flight, the first American rocket launch since 2011 and the NASA’s Space X Crew 1 Mission.
2021 HIGHLIGHTS
Mars 2020 Perseverance rover is scheduled to land inside the 28-mile Jerezo Crater, on Feb. 18. Perseverance will search for signs of ancient life in Jerezo Crater which harbored a lake and river delta billions of years ago. The rover will collect and store samples for future return to Earth, along with demonstrating technology that could aid in future exploration. A tiny helicopter named, Ingenuit