August sky at night — click on the image below to see a larger version

I seem to have spent much of the past few months complaining about living in the UK. That’s not a result of the dismal summer weather, not that that helps, but because of the maddening tendency recently of celestial events not to co-operate.

On August 1 we mostly miss out on the best of the most spectacular event of all, a total solar eclipse. The highlight during the few minutes the total phase lasts is the ghostly, pale white glow of the Sun’s outer atmosphere, the corona, but to see that you will need to be in northern Canada, Greenland, Siberia or on the border between China and Mongolia. Away from the track of totality the eclipse is less spectacular. Although observers as far north as Aberdeen will see 40 per cent of the Sun covered by the Moon, the effect on light levels will not be easily noticeable. As a result, looking straight at the eclipsed Sun is still dangerous and should never be attempted.

However, it is possible to get a good view of the eclipse by projecting an image using a pinhole in a piece of cardboard, or even by looking for the shadows cast through closely packed tree leaves. In London, which sees a 20 per cent eclipse, the event begins around 9.30 BST and maximum eclipse is at 10am. The next eclipse in its Saros cycle, number 126, will bring totality to a large swath of central Spain in 2026. It might be worth booking flights now.

Lunar eclipses are nowhere near as spectacular as their solar counterparts, but they are visible from anywhere where the Moon is above the horizon. August 16 brings a conveniently scheduled example, which begins at 20.36 BST just as the Moon is rising. While not total, at peak eclipse at about 22.10 the Earth’s shadow will cover almost 80 per cent of the Moon’s surface.

That should be enough for the characteristic colour of this eclipse to become obvious. Each lunar eclipse is different, with a range running from a light pink through to almost complete darkness with the eclipsed portion of the Moon completely invisible.

The colour is determined not by the Moon, but by the state of the Earth’s atmosphere. The 1883 explosion of the Krakatoa volcano in Indonesia, powerful enough to be heard in places as far away as Sri Lanka and Australia, threw huge quantities of dust into the upper atmosphere causing a sequence of especially dark eclipses.

Observing the 1885 event from Tasmania, a Mr Biggs reported to the Royal Astronomical Society that “all within the shadow was utterly obliterated — lost in the dead slatey tint of the sky”. By contrast, barring dramatic explosions in the next few weeks, I predict August’s eclipse will be relatively light in tone.

Farther into the solar system, Jupiter remains a spectacularly bright evening object, hanging low above the southern horizon in the constellation of Sagittarius. Sagittarius itself is the celestial centaur or archer, but to me is only recognisable when you think of it as a teapot. If you have a telescope, it is worth battling the turbulent atmosphere to keep an eye on events.

I wrote a few months ago about the two companions that have joined the most famous feature on the planet, the Great Red Spot or GRS. The smaller of the two newcomers passed between the other two at the end of July, emerging battered but still intact. It seems likely that it will be caught by the GRS and undergo further changes but predictions are difficult as nothing quite like this has been recorded in nearly 400 years of telescopic observation.

Of the other naked eye planets, Venus is just visible in the west after sunset and is, as ever, bright enough to be utterly unmistakable. Mercury becomes an evening object as the month wears on, but is mostly lost in the glare of late summer twilight. Mars, in Virgo, and Saturn, in Leo, are also lurking in the evening twilight, both well past their best. Neptune and Uranus are well placed. The former is at opposition in Capricornus on August 15, while Uranus should just reach naked eye visibility, lying to the south of the circlet in Pisces, just beneath the square of Pegasus.

Finally, congratulations to Makemake. This distant world, named after the creation deity of the people of Easter Island, officially became the fourth dwarf planet in the solar system last month, joining demoted Pluto, distant Eris and the largest asteroid, Ceres. If you would like to find it, it shines faintly in Coma Berenices.