Video: Jupiter Rolling Across The Night Sky.

You can see Jupiter in the night sky tonight. Don’t believe me? Believe Phil Plait! Well, okay, you could have  right after sunset. People on the west coast! Do it! For me! Did you miss it? Then console yourself with this video made by  Emil Kraaikamp of Jupiter rolling across the night sky.

Swoon.

Bad Astronomy:

Jupiter appears to roll across the screen because he aligned all the images on the clouds you can see on the planet; keep your eyes on the Great Red Spot, for example, and you’ll see it doesn’t move inside the frame. So as Jupiter’s rapid rotation (once every ten hours or so) makes it spin visibly even over the time of these observations, which in turn makes it look like it’s rolling.

The dot on the right is the moon Europa, which orbits Jupiter every three and a half days. Its orbital motion relative to Jupiter appears to make it move to the right as Jupiter moves left, and it disappears out of the telescope’s field of view.