• You've got about another month or two to see a uniquely summer star, Antares in the constellation Scorpius, in the evening. It is the brightest star near the moon tonight, in the southern to southwest sky as night begins. Depending on where you live worldwide, the moon will be at or near first quarter phase or exhibit a slight waxing gibbous moon. The moon and Antares will drift westward throughout the night, to set at late evening or around midnight.
• Antares sets some 4 minutes earlier with each passing night. By late September or October, Antares will be

tough to spot in the southwestern twilight after sunset.
• In ancient Chinese thought, the summer season was associated with the direction south, with the element fire, and with the color red. No wonder, then, that this reddish star in the south - beautiful Antares - was considered the Fire Star of the ancient Chinese.
• To us in the Northern Hemisphere, Antares appears as a bright reddish star that rides relatively low in the south all summer. We know it as a great ball of gases, a thermonuclear cauldron radiating unimaginable amounts of energy into the blackness and vastness of space.
• Yet to us - as to the ancient Chinese - Antares appears so near the southern horizon that we must view it through a great thickness of air. The air through which we view Antares causes this star to twinkle rapidly! On any summer evening, if you see a bright red star low in the south that's twinkling fiercely … it's probably Antares.
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