Bakersfield Night Sky 2025

Mars is low in the west on the left side of Leo in the early evening. Mars drops down too low to see a bit after 10 p.m. The summer constellations of Scorpius, Sagittarius, Ophiuchus, and Hercules are due south at that time. Pegasus is beginning to...

Two days ago, July 3, was aphelion day when Earth is farthest from the sun at a whopping 94,502,939 miles away. For us in the northern hemisphere, our part of Earth is tipped towards the sun, so the sunlight angle is much more direct and...

In today’s pre-dawn morning sky, a thin waning crescent moon is to the upper right of super-bright Venus low in the east. Over the next couple of mornings, the crescent moon will get even thinner as it slides by the Pleiades cluster at the shoulder...

Mars is the only planet easily visible in the evening sky now.  It is about 5 degrees (half a fist width at arm’s length) to the lower right of the bright star, Regulus, at the end of the sickle part of Leo, about halfway up in the western sky at 9...

The William M Thomas Planetarium is closed for the summer break at Bakersfield College. Yesterday, we celebrated the largest graduating class at Commencement. While many other colleges across the country, including many community colleges in...

The pre-dawn morning sky is now as interesting as the evening sky with super-bright Venus and medium-bright Saturn gracing the eastern sky before sunrise and super-bright Jupiter and medium-bright Mars in the western and south-western sky after...

Tickets are still on sale for the last show of the spring season at the William M Thomas Planetarium: Black Holes on April 24. Tomorrow, April 20, is the end of Bakersfield College’s spring break and the last weekend of the Bakersfield area schools’...

Tickets are on sale for the last shows of the spring season at the William M Thomas Planetarium: Dynamic Earth on April 10 and Black Holes on April 24. Jupiter will be the first star-like object you see in the evening after sunset with a brightness...

Our season of spring officially begins when the sun crosses north of the celestial equator at the March equinox. For those in the southern hemisphere, that marks the beginning of their season of fall/autumn. This year the March equinox is on March...

While Saturn has now sunk into the twilight glow too close to the sun to be seen in the evening sky on its way to solar conjunction on March 15, Mercury continues to climb upward away from the sun in the west to keep the planet parade going for a...

The “parade of planets” in the evening sky continues. Starting the evening of February 22, Mercury will join the line-up but it will be very low near the horizon shortly after sunset, so you might need binoculars to pick it out in the twilight glow....

The spring season of shows at the William M Thomas Planetarium begin this Friday and Saturday (February 7 & 8) with three showings of Mesmerica each night. Later in February, on Thursday, February 20, is the showing of “Ice Worlds”. Other shows...