July 6th - Earth at Aphelion - The Earth reaches its furthest distance from the Sun along its yearly path, approximately 94,500,000 miles away.

 

July 7th (am) - The Moon and Saturn will meet in the early morning skies. Catch the pair rising in the east around 1:30am, moving through the sky together until dawn.

 

July 10/11th (am) - The Moon and Mars will meet up with the more distant Pleiades and Hyades star clusters in the pre-dawn skies. Look east between 5:00 and 5:30am on either morning to spot the crescent moon, the Red Planet, and two of the most easily viewed clusters in the sky.

 

July 17th - A thin crescent Moon will appear next to Venus low on the western horizon after sunset. The pair will set shortly after 10PM.

 

 

July 5th - Japan's Hayabusa 2 spacecraft will perform a flyby of the asteroid Torifune. This is part of an extended mission, following the spacecraft's successful visit to the asteroid Ryugu in June 2018 and sample return in December 2020.

 

July 14th - Three crew members—NASA astronaut Anil Menon and Russian cosmonauts Pyotr Dubrov and Anna Kikina—are scheduled to launch aboard a Russian Soyuz vehicle for the International Space Station.

 

 

July 1st, 2004 - The Cassini spacecraft entered orbit around Saturn, becoming the first and only Saturn orbiter to date.

 

July 4th, 1997 - The Mars Pathfinder mission touched down on the surface, followed a day later by the release of the Sojourner rover - the first ever Mars rover.

 

July 4th, 2005 - The Deep Impact mission released an 820-pound copper projectile that impacted Comet Tempel 1 at a speed of 23,000 mph. Analyzing the impact plume provided insights into cometary interiors.

 

July 20th, 1969 - Neil Armstrong, accompanied by Buzz Aldrin, became the first humans to step foot on the Moon's surface while Michael Collins remained in lunar orbit.

 

July 7th - 3rd Quarter

July 14th - New

July 21st - 1st Quarter

July 29th - Full (Buck Moon)

 

 

Mercury - Visible very low on the western horizon after sunset at the beginning of the month, quickly becoming lost to the Sun. Reappears in the pre-dawn eastern skies toward the end of the month.

 

Venus - Visible in the western sky after sunset all month, slowly sinking lower on the horizon and closer to the Sun.

 

Mars - Slowly getting higher in the pre-dawn eastern sky, but still close to the horizon.

 

Jupiter - Very low on the western horizon after sunset at the beginning of the month, quickly lost to the Sun the rest of the month.

 

Saturn - Rises in the east around 2am at the beginning of the month, midnight at the end of the month - visible until sunrise.