A sinister cluster, a snake-haired monster and a minor meteor shower
Lots of Halloween characters will roam your neighborhood next Saturday night, but Halloween will hang in the night sky all this week and over the next few weeks.
Some sinister shiners are rising in the northeast sky. It’s the famous, or some would say infamous, Pleiades Star Cluster, also known as the “Seven Little Sisters.” This time of year, it’s also called the “Halloween Cluster” because it rises in the northeast early in the evening and climbs high in the Butler sky around midnight. You can’t miss it; it’s easily visible to the naked eye and resembles a miniature Big Dipper. Astronomically, the Pleiades is a group of over 100 young stars, more than 410 light-years away, born together from a huge cloud of hydrogen gas 100 million years ago. By the way, if you’re new to this column, just one light-year equals nearly six trillion miles!
Many ancient people worshipped and feared the Pleiades because the cluster was associated with death. When it rose high in the sky around midnight this time of year, people thought it was the right time to honor the dead. Some cultures, like the early Egyptians, believed that whenever the Pleiades reached their zenith, natural disasters, as well as human-made ones like war could occur more easily.
Probably the most sinister constellation on the rise is Perseus the Hero, just above and to the left of the Pleiades. Perseus himself isn't all that bad but the monster’s head he’s toting with him is the evil monster Medusa. According to Greek and Roman mythology, the king of the gods sent Perseus to rid the countryside of Medusa, a monster who literally was “stoning” everyone!
Medusa was one of the most horrible monsters you could imagine. In fact, you couldn’t even look at this beast that always had a bad hair day. That’s because her hair consisted of dozens of poisonous snakes sticking out of her head. If Medusa came into your neighborhood you didn’t have to worry about multiple snakebites, because you’d be stoned before they ever got to you. Medusa had to be stopped before all of humanity became stone cold. Perseus pursued the horrible monster. Armed with the wings of Mercury, the messenger of the gods and Athena's magic shield, the goddess of wisdom, he killed Medusa by slicing off her snake-ridden head with his razor sword without looking at the monster. Don’t ask me how he pulled that off. It must have been Athena’s magical shield.
To honor Perseus, the gods and goddesses placed his body in the stars as the constellation we see rising this Halloween week. With a little imagination, you can see a crooked stickman about halfway between the horizon and the zenith in the northeastern sky. The Pleiades are just off his feet. As you look at the constellation be careful, however, because he’s still holding up Medusa’s severed head, marked by the fairly bright star Algol. I don’t want you to get stoned.
Algol is also known as the “Demon Star” because it actually blinks as it dims in brightness. It’s certainly not a strobe light because it dims about every three days and stays dim for about nine hours before brightening again. Astronomically, it’s known as an eclipsing binary variable star. It’s actually a three-star system, but two of the larger stars eclipse each other in their nearly three-day orbit.
There’s also a minor meteor shower starting up later this haunted week called the Taurids. They actually peak out in early November, but they’re getting going this week. The Earth, in its path around the sun, is running into a fairly sparse debris trail left behind by Comet Encke. Most of this debris is no bigger than pebble size, but when they slam into our atmosphere at over 65 thousand miles an hour they really light up the sky. You probably won’t see many of them while you’re taking the children out trick-or-treating, though. They’re best seen after midnight, originating from the constellation Taurus the Bull, but be careful after midnight because that’s when it can really get spooky around Halloween!
Mike Lynch is an amateur astronomer and professional broadcast meteorologist for WCCO Radio in Minneapolis/St. Paul. He is also the author of “Stars: a Month by Month Tour of the Constellations,” published by Adventure Publications and available at bookstores and at adventurepublications.net. Contact him at mikewlynch@comcast.net.
