Only Asteroid Visible to Naked Eye in Sky This Week

chuckpeters writes "Vesta, the only asteroid that can be seen by the naked eye will be visible over the next week. Vesta was the fourth asteroid to be discovered and is the second largest. It is in the constellation Virgo and has just passed opposition. Vesta has very large, circular crater near the asteroid's south pole that is so deep it exposes the mantle. The asteroid appears to have differentiated into layers like the planets."

Comments

Virgo can be seen equally well from both.

[MarkusQ]

There's nothing at starryskies.com (yes, I read (skimmed) the article) to say where you can view this asteroid from. I wish these astronomy sites would remember that it's possible to view the night sky from Down Under too ...

It's in the constellation Virgo (see the diagram at the very end of the article). Virgo can be seen from pretty much anywhere on earth (Think about it: the sun spends one month a year in Virgo, and nobody complains that they can't see it from their home town).

From Melbourne (aka "Mel'b'n") Virgo should be about half way up, to the north, moving across the sky from east to west as the night progresses. Use a southern hemisphere star chart if you need help locating it. The aforementioned diagram tells where to look in Virgo to see the asteroid, depending on the date.

-- MarkusQ