The Top 10 Dazzling Celestial Events of 2022
The end of the year brings with it many shining examples of how dazzling our galaxy is. 2022 was no exception. The celestial activity was off the chart, and we wanted to give you our team’s top ten cosmic events that took our breath away—from the bottom to the top pick.
10. A Planetary Trio
When planets line up, it is a spectacular galactic event. Saturn, Mars, and Jupiter formed a peak from March 24 to April 5, 2022. If you were up right before sunrise during the spring months, you might have spotted the cluster that looked unusually close. (We can see five planets without a telescope—Jupiter, Mars, Saturn, Venus, and Mercury.)
9. Planetary Conjunctions
It was a very busy time for planetary meetups, with the spring season having the most. Before dawn in early spring, if you stepped outside or looked out your window, the bright, orangeish glow of Jupiter would have appeared to buddy up with the yellow-white, sometimes pinkish haze of Venus. There were many conjunctions between Mercury and Uranus and Venus and Mars, totaling twelve planetary conjunctions in 2022.
8. Moon and Planet Conjunctions
Most of the time, the moon and planets keep their distance in the night sky. Though at the end of December, four planets appeared closer than normal to the moon. Jupiter, Saturn, Mercury, and Venus took turns kissing the moon along its travel to its fullest on December 27 at 3:33 GMT. The end of 2022 is a time to check out planets in rare form illuminated by the moon.
7. Many Meteor Showers
There were so many meteor showers in 2022. It’s hard to say how many people made wishes on shooting stars. Eight meteor showers in 2022 produced an average of 100 space rocks each night. The best time in 2022 to have witnessed the streaking plasma was after dusk in an area with little light pollution—like the beach or mountains. We hope you made your wish in 2022 and it comes true in 2023!
6. Summer Star Trio
Forming a perfect triangle in the night sky, the star constellations Deneb, Altair, and Vega (one of our brightest) formed a celestial womb on July 26, 2022. Not only was that night graced with this unusual alignment, but it was also the beginning date of the ancient Egyptian calendar and the opening of the Lion’s Gate when the brightest star in our galaxy, Sirius, rises before the sun. Marking those days as the “Dog Days “ of summer.
5. Starlink and James Web Telescope
If you witnessed a moving chain of bright dots in the night sky, you might have caught a glimpse of Starlink and the James Webb Telescope. Webb launched in 2021 but hit L2–the second Lagrangian point– in 2022. It’s the exact point where, in the Earth-sun relationship, gravitational forces and movement are balanced. You can watch it in real-time. Starlink is an Elon Musk venture and is a large satellite system that aims to provide reliable internet to the most remote locations on Earth. More news will follow regarding how having a global online connection will change things in 2023.
4. Star Clusters & The Moon
It’s true. Our team has a motto: “Live by the sun. Love by the moon.” When a star constellation pairs up with the moon, we swoon. The Pleiades, known as M45, is a cluster of six bright stars that look like a mini dipper. It’s about 444 lightyears away from Earth. On March 8, 2022, the bright Pleiades accompanied the waxing crescent moon. It looked like the star cluster was sitting on the edge of the moon while dipping its toes into the night sky, making it a beautiful stellar event in 2022.
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3. Two Full Supermoons - Only 30-days Apart
Full supermoons are rare. Yet, in 2022, we had two back-to-back. In June and then in July, the Strawberry full moon and Buck full moon illuminated the night sky in a stellar way. The glow from the two full supermoons was so bright it was hard for us to capture them—it was like a spotlight in the night sky. At omni, we love moon bathing and got to do it during the hot summer months—it was cosmically divine.
2. Two Total Lunar Eclipses
We didn’t have one, but two total lunar eclipses. During May and November, the sun, Earth, and moon aligned, and the night sky was ablaze in an unprecedented show of a total lunar eclipse. A lunar eclipse is often called a "blood moon" because the sun's sparse light leaves a red tint on the moon's surface. That's because red light emits a longer wavelength than blue light and fragments less in our atmosphere. So, we get an eerie reddish glow on our moon.
1. The Planet Parade
The most spectacular celestial event that only happens maybe every 500 years was the line-up of six planets from June 19 to June 27, 2022 (the next planetary line-up will happen in 2040 and 2854). Early risers during that time would’ve spotted the rare alignment of planets, like a belt in the night sky. Mercury, Venus, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, and Uranus paraded in a perfect line with the moon. Uranus was the only planet you needed a telescope to see; the other five were visible to the naked eye. It was our team’s favorite celestial event and kicked off summer 2022 in a big cosmic way!
We hope you enjoyed our top ten stellar events. Do you have some favorites? For us, any cosmic event is worth celebrating. See all of you in 2023!