During the fall and spring equinoxes, the sun rises due east and sets due west, creating an effect dubbed “Chicagohenge.”
Adler Planetarium
With a NASCAR street race set to take place outside their front doors, Chicago’s lakefront museums have had to shift gears and adjust operations in advance of the big event July 1-2.
The Green Comet is making its closest pass to Earth Wednesday night and the skies are looking clear enough for Adler Planetarium to host a virtual viewing party.
NASA’s Ingenuity Mars helicopter is the first aircraft humankind has ever created that is capable of powered, controlled flight on another world. NASA’s team lead on the project discusses its significance.
Sky watchers will have their eyes peeled Wednesday night for a rare-ish celestial event: an “eclipse” of Mars.
Election Day 2022 will kick off with a pre-dawn total lunar eclipse. There won't be another like it until March 2025.
Jupiter is making its closest approach to Earth since 1963 on Monday night, and the views should be especially spectacular.
The five planets that are visible to the naked eye are now lining up in a particularly unique formation in the early morning hours, all of them appearing in the same part of the sky. Want to catch the show? We’ve got tips.
After a string of clear, sunny days, rain and clouds are expected to move in for the weekend. Depending on the extent of the cloud cover, the eclipse could still deliver an “ooh-aah” moment, or it could be a womp-womp for Chicago.
Delivering on a promise she made when the owners of the Chicago Bears announced their purchase of the Arlington International Racecourse property, Mayor Lori Lightfoot announced the members of a working group tasked with reimagining the city’s lakefront museum campus.
Comet Leonard, discovered in January of this year by astronomer Greg Leonard, is racing toward the sun and will make its closest pass of Earth in the coming days. The Adler Planetarium is hosting a viewing session Tuesday morning.
For once, the weather cooperated in Chicago. Astronomers at the Adler Planetarium proclaimed: “What a stellar view!”
If the skies are clear, Chicagoans will have an excellent chance of seeing the eclipse Friday morning, with the best hours for viewing the event being approximately 1:30-4:30 a.m.
Palos Preserves has been named an Urban Night Sky Place by the International Dark-Sky Association. The site emits nearly 1,000 times less light than downtown Chicago, with four times as many stars visible in the night sky than can be seen in the city.
A return to pre-pandemic business as usual is not yet in the stars for the Chicago cultural institution, though some screenings and public observing events will make an in-person comeback beginning July 3.
Chicagoans aren’t in the right place or time zone to see Wednesday’s lunar eclipse at its peak. Just when the show gets interesting, the moon will sink from view.
