Valentine Sky 2025
The night sky is the window to the rest of our universe but it’s also great for lovers. It’s great being in the dark with the one you love. Then you add a full moon in the sky to add to the romance.
We’re in luck this year because the moon is officially full Feb. 12, but on Feb. 14, it still will be close to a full moon. There also are other celestial features that can add to Valentine's Day romance, and I’d like to lead you to them this week in Starwatch.
I think the very best sign of love and romance in the Butler heavens is the planet Venus, shining brightly in the early evening southwestern sky. It pops out during twilight and it’s, by far, the brightest starlike celestial jewel in the sky. Appropriately, Venus is named after the Roman goddess of love! Make sure you look for Venus early in the evening, because it slips below the horizon shortly after 8 p.m.
Perennially, there are the constellations Cassiopeia and Cepheus, who, according to Greek and Roman mythology, were the King and Queen of ancient Ethiopia. It’s quite an involved tale as to how they got up into the night sky, and I’ll tell you more about that when I feature them next month. In a nutshell, Queen Cassiopeia’s vanity was only eclipsed by the wrath of Greek gods, namely Hera, the queen of the gods, and Poseidon, the god of the sea. In a fit of temper, they tied Cassiopeia into her throne and tossed her into the sky. When Cepheus found out what happened to his wife he begged Zeus, the king of the gods, to heave him up into the heavens next to his beloved so they could be together for all time.
As soon as twilight fades, look for those lovers together in the high northwestern sky. The constellation Cassiopeia is a W-shaped formation of bright stars outlining the throne of the banished queen with her bound to it. The constellation Cepheus is not nearly as bright as Cassiopeia and looks nothing like a king. It reminds me of a house with a very steep roof.
Another celestial reminder of Valentine’s Day is the bright star Betelgeuse, the second brightest star in the constellation Orion the Hunter. Even though it marks one of Orion’s armpits, it has a real connection to the holiday.
Betelgeuse has a reddish hue and reaches its highest point in the sky in mid-February, but its best connection to Valentine’s Day is that it literally behaves like a giant beating heart, and what a big heart it is! In fact, when gazing upon Betelgeuse in the early evening southeastern sky, I can safely say that you’re looking at one of the largest single things you’ve ever seen. It pulses in size in roughly a six-year cycle, and at its maximum it is close to a billion miles in diameter. By comparison, our own sun’s diameter isn’t even a million miles.
Most astronomers feel that within the next 100,000 to 1 million years, Betelgeuse will suffer the ultimate heartbreak when it explodes in a colossal supernova. There will be no quick emotional rebound when that happens.
We have one more Valentine's Day reminder in our evening sky this year — the planet Mars, which, last month, reached its closest approach to Earth in over two years. It’s the brightest starlike object you can see to the upper left of the famous constellation Orion the Hunter. Mars’ obvious connection to Valentine’s Day is that it’s red — or at least orange-red — but that’s it because Mars is named after the Roman god of war.
May you draw closer and closer to the one you love — even if you’ve been together for years and years — under the stars.
Mike Lynch is an amateur astronomer and professional broadcast meteorologist for WCCO Radio in Minneapolis/St. Paul. He is also the author of “Stars: a Month by Month Tour of the Constellations,” published by Adventure Publications and available at bookstores and at adventurepublications.net. Contact him at mikewlynch@comcast.net.
