Comments | little_details: Stars visible on the first morning of the Battle of the Somme

haradwen in little_details

Stars visible on the first morning of the Battle of the Somme

Jan 25, 2015 10:34

What stars would have been visible on the eastern horizon from the Allied lines just before dawn on 1 July 1916? (Once you got above the ground mist.) I think it's Taurus and its neighbours. The proofreader has queried this ( Read more... )

~science: astronomy, france: history, ~world war i, 1910-1919

Comments 8

reynardo January 25 2015, 07:32:42 UTC

I'm having a similar problem with sunrise on Neave, but if that's a constant error, then you just need to play through the timer until it gets to "sunrise" and see what comes up then.

Not only am I also getting Taurus and the Sisters, but Mars is big and pretty angry - a perfect metaphor to be thrown into your story.

And thank you for this - I'm now going to incorporate the stars coming out on a certain night ride in a story I'm in the middle of.

haradwen January 25 2015, 21:32:32 UTC

I had even more trouble with Neave..! I'm so not good at this sort of thing. I ran through sunrise on Stellarium like you suggested, and found yes, Taurus! But as the person below suggested, too close to sunrise to be visible. So... an hour earlier; Mars just rising (thank-you! and I'll pick a higher constellation to use.

bopeepsheep January 25 2015, 11:27:30 UTC

Using Neave and my own location (southern England) I get Taurus clearly right above the horizon at 4.35am as the sun is starting to rise on 1 July 1916. It continues to be visible until about 5.01am. There's obviously a small adjustment needed for the Somme [200 miles SE of here, more or less exactly] but not much in the scheme of things!

haradwen January 25 2015, 21:38:35 UTC

After a bit of a struggle on both programmes, I've found Taurus, yay in the right place, but as tethys89 points out, too close to the sun to be easily seen (except perhaps Aldebaran which is unfortunately the lowest of its bright stars.) But! higher up I spotted Pegasus. Absolutely ideal for a Royal Flying Corps story.

bopeepsheep January 25 2015, 21:56:30 UTC

I wasn't sure how long before dawn you meant, but yeah, it's pretty hard to spot Mercury at that time of year and Taurus is harder than that. Jupiter is much easier but less useful symbolically...

Yay for Pegasus! I have a soft spot for RFC stories so I'm glad you found what you need!

haradwen January 25 2015, 22:14:54 UTC

I've got a little bit of leeway depending on whether it's before or after the pre-flight briefing. The advance began at seven :( :( so they'd need to be in the air to cover that; therefore looking at the sky before they go into the briefing room.

I've just been reading Sagittarius Rising - which is why I'm thinking hard about the "ad astra" part of the motto!

tethys89 January 25 2015, 11:34:24 UTC

I think Stellarium always gives you the time as it would be at your computer's location, not where you're looking at the stars for, so if you're somewhere like Australia you are going to get very odd times for sunrise/sunset in Europe (currently Stellarium is telling me sunset would be about 10am in Perth in July, which seems unlikely unless it's using my local time for it :-p ( ... )

haradwen January 25 2015, 21:54:58 UTC

if you're somewhere like Australia

spot-on...

Thank-you so much for making that image - it's very clear what the problem would be, especially with a ground-mist. I went outside just before sunrise this morning, and yes, by the time Taurus had risen he'd be more or less invisible. I think I could get away with Mars on the horizon, an hour or so earlier - but Taurus wouldn't have risen by then. So I'm going for Pegasus, higher up - unmistakeable and highly appropriate for my POV pilot!