Astronomy Picture of the Day - Welcome to Perihelion

NASA ^ | 4 Jan, 2024 | Image Credit & Copyright: Peter Ward (Barden Ridge Observatory)

[MtnClimber]

Explanation: Earth's orbit around the Sun is not a circle, it's an ellipse. The point along its elliptical orbit where our fair planet is closest to the Sun is called perihelion. This year perihelion is today, January 4, at 13:28 UTC, with the Earth about 147 million kilometers from the Sun. For comparison, at aphelion on last July 3 Earth was at its farthest distance from the Sun, some 152 million kilometers away. But distance from the Sun doesn't determine Earth's seasons. It's only by coincidence that the beginning of southern summer (northern winter) on the December solstice - when this H-alpha picture of the active Sun was taken - is within 14 days of Earth's perihelion date. And it's only by coincidence that Earth's perihelion date is within 11 days of the historic perihelion of NASA's Parker Solar Probe. Launched in 2018, the Parker Solar Probe flew within 6.2 million kilometers of the Sun's surface on 2024 December 24, breaking its own record for closest perihelion for a spacecraft from planet Earth.

[MtnClimber]

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For more detail go to the link and click on the image for a high definition image. You can then move the magnifying glass cursor then click to zoom in and click again to zoom out. When zoomed in you can scan by moving the side bars on the bottom and right side of the image.

[MtnClimber]

[MtnClimber]

Pinging the APOD list

🪐 🌟 🌌 🍔

[ComputerGuy]

When I was in the fourth or fifth grade, they showed us a movie at school called Our Mr. Sun. Great stuff.

[Strict9]

thanks for this. That’s information I would have missed.

[Boiler Plate]

It doesn’t feel like a Perihelion. It’s down right frigid.

[No name given]

Wow.

[Repeal The 17th]

“...perihelion...with the Earth 147 million kilometers from the Sun.”
“...aphelion...with the Earth 152 million kilometers from the Sun.”
-
It has always puzzled me as to why being 5 million kilometers
closer to the sun (3.1 million miles) seems to make no difference.

[Jamestown1630]

You’re at the wrong end of the ‘tilted’ Earth.

On July 3, you’ll say it doesn’t feel like aphelion, too. Neither makes much difference in how we feel :-)

[Tom Tetroxide]

Mars’ closest approach to Earth and opposition will be on and near the 15th of this month.

[Diana in Wisconsin]

If we’re the closest we get to the Sun all year, why is it so friggin’ COLD outside? ;)

[MtnClimber]

If we’re the closest we get to the Sun all year, why is it so friggin’ COLD outside? ;)

Clearly it is the Glow Bull Warming.

[Deaf and Discerning]

It has always puzzled me as to why being 5 million kilometers closer to the sun (3.1 million miles) seems to make no difference.

I was just thinking of that!

[Jonty30]

It kind of looks like a tightly wound ball of yarn.

[Diana in Wisconsin]

Nope. It’s Wisconsin. In January. ;)

[Diana in Wisconsin]

You're thinking of the Moon. ;)