10 most special nights in 2008

Here are the most notable events that will take place in the sky this year, provided by SPACE's Night Sky Magazine.

February 1: The coincidence of Venus and Jupiter, phase 1. This will be the first of two "meeting" of the two brightest planets in the sky then. It happened in the early morning, lying low in the east-northeast and seeing clearly 45 minutes before sunrise.

February 20-21: Full moon eclipse. The eclipse will happen in the second half of the night, visible on most of North America, and a little shorter than usual (only 50 minutes).

May 10: The obscurity of the Beehive constellation. The crescent moon passes in front of the famous constellation Beehive in the air of North America, creating a beautiful sight in binoculars and weak telescopes. The members of this constellation will disappear behind the dark edge of the moon and reappear after about 1 hour behind the bright edge.

May 21-22: Jupiter has no satellite! Anyone who sheds telescopes on Jupiter on this day will hardly see some or all of its four famous satellites. This is an extremely rare event because normally, when observing this planet, people always see at least 2 or 3 satellites included.

June 30: The obscurity of the Pleiades constellation, caused by the moon.

August 1: Total solar eclipse, seen in Siberia, Passage in northwestern Canada, western Mongolia and the western end of the Great Wall (China).

August 11-12: Perseid meteor.

August 16: Partial Moon. Europe, Africa and Asia will be the best places to observe about 4/5 of the earth's shadow surface.

September 19: Another eclipse of Pleiades, caused by the moon.

December 1: Venus and Jupiter appear together, phase 2. This is the second time in the two planets and appears the brightest in the sky, not long after sunset. The crescent moon will join the duo to create an impressive triangle, and make even those who rarely lift their eyes to heaven pay attention.

T. An