Okay i'm in work at 6:30 am today ......Which is the earliest i've probably been in for about 20 years
Anyways when i'm getting into the car this morning i can see this Huuuge star? in the Western sky .....now i know it cant be a star so it's got to be a Planet right?
Which one ?.......This looked about 10/15 times bigger than a star and was reeeeeealy bright.
Thanks

Sounds like Venus. It is currently rising about 3 hours before sunrise. After the Sun and Moon it is the brightest object in the sky.

Can you see this from Western Sydney?

Yes, that's Venus mate, it can be very bright in the night sky.

Venus is also called the "morning star" becuase you can see it every morning before sunrise, and it's also called the evening star.

Thanks guys
I'm used to seeing Venus in the evening Sky .....but i've never seen it as large or as bright as that before.....Ta

I think it might look so large low in the sky due to an atmospheric lensing effect.

Sometimes the moon when low in the sky can appear huge due to the same effect. It's quite a noticable difference compared to when the object is high in the sky.

Actually, if you're in the Northern Hemisphere, it could be the Comet Holmes, currently visible to the naked eye.

It'll appear like a very large and bright yellowish star in the Perseus constellation.

More info available here - Comet Holmes

Back in October the gas/dust cloud surrounding it expanded suddenly to become larger than the sun, although the comet itself is only 3.4 km in size.

Many news articles can be found on the Comet at Google News

I also heard that mars is extremely bright right now as it's as close to earth as it ever gets, so maybe. Waspie correct me if I'm wrong.

Yes, I thought it might me Comet Holmes as well
Or could it be Mars maybe? It has doubled in brightness these last few days/weeks, and it is also red.

EDIT: ah Silver Thong, you beat me to it

changed my mind,

Waspie...

Correct me if I'm incorrect here, but the OP mentioned the Western sky in the Early am hours...

I think Venus, which is of course brilliant, is in the East.

Isn't that Mars over there (she's been quite bright since September)?

If you're looking North towards Gemini Mars crosses in the eastern sky. I'm not too sure what the OP is seeing in the western sky.

Yes now that you mention it MID, sunrise is also at the east.., and venus is always just above sunrise ( morning star ), so venus is at the East not at the western sky, what a stupid mistake I made.

Yes, Lil. Correct.

I think the thing I picked up on is the time and direction the OP was posting.
Mars transits of course, and it's currently rising NE and setting NW...at 40 degrees N. Anywhere from about 20 to 50 N you'll see it setting in the morning from WNW to NW for some time.

At 6:30am, I think that's what one would see prominently in the Western skies.

Well my front door faces NE and the object was to the right as i stood outside....To me it looked much larger than i've ever seen Mars.
I mean this was huge and bright

AHA!

I think we're now getting our compass directions fleshed out!


If you walk out your northeast facing door and look to your right, you're looking east to east southeast.
What you're seeing in that case would be Venus.

Venus is very bright, and white. Mars is also very bright now, but decidedly reddish.
Take a look at that object with a decent pair of binoculars that you can steady in a rather narrow field of view and you'll likely see her in phase. She is currently in what we would call waxing gibbous when observing the Moon.

That'll confirm it for you!

Like this (23:23UT, 12-12-07, 18:23 EST)