The shooting stars of August accompanied by 5 full moons

August is known for being the month of shooting stars , the popular Perseids , but there will be two leading ladies competing for the stage: taking the stage in the August night sky will be a Moon that will be the protagonist of 5 phases instead of the usual 4, and Venus will impose itself on the attention beautiful and brilliant , but only for lovers of the dawn.

“The full Moon on August 9th will disturb the first days of activity of the expected Perseid meteor shower, the popular 'tears of San Lorenzo' – Paolo Volpini of theItalian Amateur Astronomers Union told ANSA – but in the following days the Moon will rise later and later and the interference of the moonlight on the observation of the meteors will be less impactful and we may have the opportunity to spot a fair number of light trails in conjunction with the maximum activity , expected on the night between August 12th and 13th ”.

A curious feature of the month is the five lunar phases , instead of the usual four, with August 1st and 31st seeing the Moon in its First Quarter phase twice in the same month . Among the most spectacular events in the August sky is Venus , which, rising almost three hours before the Sun , will reach its longest period of visibility in 2025.

Another event not to be missed, notes the UAI, is the close conjunction between Venus and Jupiter : the two brightest planets will meet in the constellation of Gemini, where we could see them before dawn on August 12 , while in the early morning of August 20 a spectacular quintet will appear in the east: in the center there will be the thin crescent of the waning Moon , to its left the brightest stars of the constellation of Gemini, Castor and Pollux , to the right the two brightest planets, Jupiter and Venus , which after the conjunction on the 12th will have moved away.