• The darkness after midnight and before daybreak belongs to the waning gibbous moon and the planet Jupiter tonight. These two beautiful worlds - Jupiter and our companion moon - will appear in the east after midnight on Friday night. They'll steadily climb upward until dawn breaks Saturday morning. Jupiter outshines all the true stars in the sky, and is only exceeded in brilliance by the planet Venus, which you'll also find before dawn tomorrow - closer to the horizon than Jupiter and the moon.
• If you live in the southern and central parts of South America, you can watch

the moon occult - cover over - Jupiter in the morning hours tomorrow (Saturday, September 8). For the most part, the occultation will take place during the daylight hours. For much of Peru, the occultation begins at morning dawn.
• The moon will be very close to its last quarter phase tomorrow morning as seen in the U.S. This month's last quarter moon falls at 8:15 a.m. CDT (13:15 UTC) on Saturday, September 8.
• Jupiter will appear starlike in our sky, but in reality it is the solar system's largest planet. It is more massive than all the other planets, moons, and other debris in the solar system combined. And we're lucky to have it. Astronomers believe that its gravitational presence has kept Earth safe by sending asteroids and comets out of the solar system. A few still got through (sorry, dinosaurs!), but the impact history of Earth wasn't as bad as it could have been.
• The image at left shows Jupiter in a gibbous phase. This view of Jupiter can never be seen from Earth, even through telescopes. Our vantage point on Jupiter -

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