The Columbus Lions Club enjoyed a presentation about astronomy by Jim Cooper at a recent meeting. Jim has written a column titled “Sky Watch” for the Tryon Daily Bulletin for many years and has helped with setting up telescopes at Foothills Equestrian Nature Center for astronomical observations by the public.

Cooper first answered questions from the Lions, then handed out copies of a table of locations of  constellations of the zodiac and a graph showing the occurrence of super moons and blue moons. The zodiac constellations have shifted position over the last four millennia due to precession of the earth as it goes around the sun.

Super moons occur when the moon’s orbit around the earth is at perigee or closest to us, and at only some 220,000 miles appears about 14 percent larger than at apogee, or some 250,000 miles. All of these variations are the result of various gravitational pulls of the sun, earth and moon.

Cooper also explained why the moon appears so much larger when near the horizon than when it is high in the sky.

Columbus Lions meet first and third Thursdays at 6:30 p.m. at Calvert’s Kitchen in Columbus. For more information, please call Fran Goodwin at 828-894-2505.

– Submitted by Garland Goodwin