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[Music]

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what's up for May this month a special

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trip into the may sky at dusk and dawn

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many of us are staying home these days

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and it's normal to feel kind of cooped

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up yearning for wide open spaces and

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more distant horizons if you find

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yourself feeling like that this might be

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a good time to remember that we're in

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space cruising through the solar system

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on our pale blue dot with a vast

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three-dimensional universe all around us

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and we have an outstanding view now we

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often tend to look at the sky as a

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curved dome above our heads a sort of

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real-life version of a planetarium dome

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covered in a carpet of stars but

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remember in reality it's anything but

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flat the night sky is the deepest most

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open expanse of space you could possibly

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look into here's a look at what you're

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seeing when gazing at the sky in May

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looking toward the west in the hour

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after sunset here are the bright objects

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you'll most likely be able to see the

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closest of these objects is the planet

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Venus in our own solar system at about

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thirty-five million miles from Earth the

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next closest is the star Sirius it's the

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brightest star in our sky and also one

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of the most nearby at about 9 light

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years away several other bright stars in

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the May early evening sky are a couple

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to a few dozen light-years away much

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farther out is the red giant star that

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forms the shoulder of Orion Betelgeuse

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at around 500 light-years from Earth and

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although you might not be able to see it

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the faint band of the outer Milky Way

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stretches across the sky here so when

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you're looking westward in Mays early

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evening sky think about how you're

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looking outward through the disk of our

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galaxy toward its outer edges thousands

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of light-years away you'll get a

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different perspective looking into the

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sky in the hour before sunrise facing

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south the nearest objects are the moon

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at about 240 thousand miles away then

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Mars Jupiter and Saturn at hundreds of

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millions of miles the rapidly rotating

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star Altair and the star Fomalhaut with

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its debris disc and orbiting planet

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I'm much farther away at 17 and 25

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light-years from Earth and the may

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morning sky also has its own very

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distant red giant star Antares at 554

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light-years away and finally across the

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background visible under very dark skies

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is the Milky Way here you're looking

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into the center of the Milky Way galaxy

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densely packed with stars and a

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supermassive black hole some 27,000

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light-years from Earth the night sky

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that begins right above your own roof is

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really the shore of a deep cosmic ocean

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here's hoping this bring some comfort if

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here are the phases of the Moon for May

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you can catch up on NASA's mission to

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explore our solar system and beyond at

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nasa.gov I'm Preston dykes from NASA's

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Jet Propulsion Laboratory and that's