It's a once in a lifetime event: the June 5th Transit of Venus across the sun. Watch the world wide webcast sponsored by the Coca-Cola Science Center and NASA. |
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IT'S
HAPPENING NOW! The 2012 Transit
of Venus is underway. Venus's inky black disk will
cross the face of the sun, slowly gliding past sunspots
and fiery patches of solar plasma, until approximately
0450 UT on June 6th (1150 pm PDT on June 5th). Live
webcasts: #0,
#1,
#2,
#3,
#4, #5,
#6, #7.
Realtime
Transit of Venus Photo Gallery
[Submit your
photos] [NASA videos: 2012
Transit of Venus, ISS
Transit of Venus]
TRANSIT
OF VENUS: No one reading this will
still be alive the next time Venus crosses the sun
in Dec. 2117. That makes today special. On June
5th at 3:09 pm PDT, the second planet begins its
historic 7-hour transit of the solar disk. Observers
on parts of all seven continents (map)
will witness something like this:
Photo credit:
David Finlay of Sydney, Australia (June
8, 2004).
The timing favors observers in the
mid-Pacific where the sun is high overhead during
the crossing. In the USA, the transit will be at
its best around sunset. Creative photographers will
have a field day imaging the swollen red sun "punctured"
by the circular disk of Venus.
Stay tuned to Spaceweather.com's realtime
gallery for constantly updated images of the
transit. Another
photo-stream of interest comes from the International
Space Station where Don Pettit will be the first
man in history to photograph a Venus transit from
space. There are also many live webcasts
of the transit from locations around the world:
#1,
#2,
#3,
#4, #5,
#6. (Submit
more webcast links here.)
Spaceweather reader Eric Allen of Trois-Rivieres,
Quebec, has combined an image of today's sun with
NASA's predicted transit path:
"I created this transit 'finder chart' to
know where to look for first contact," explains
Allen. "That is where the Mysterious
Arc of Venus might appear."
Realtime
Transit of Venus Photo Gallery
[Submit your
photos] [NASA videos: 2012
Transit of Venus, ISS
Transit of Venus]
Observing Tip: Do
not stare at the sun. Venus covers too little of
the solar disk to block the blinding glare. Instead,
use some type of projection
technique or a solar filter. A #14 welder's
glass is a good choice. Many astronomy clubs will
have solar telescopes set up to observe the event;
contact your local club for details.
Transit of Venus Web Links:
BEFORE
THE TRANSIT: As Venus approaches
the sun, it turns its nightside toward Earth. This
turning transforms Venus into a rarely-seen thin
ring of light. Lorenzo Comolli photographed the
phenomenon from Tradate, Italy, on June 4th:
The effect is caused by particles
in upper layers of Venus's atmosphere which scatter
sunlight around the circumference of the planet.
The ring is very difficult to observe, and often
only black-belt astrophotographers are able to record
the phenomenon.
"This picture was taken while
Venus was a scant 2°17' from the sun's center, and
it was very difficult to obtain due to the extreme
proximity of the solar limb," says Comolli.
"Extreme care was due to avoid the sun light
entering the telescope. The extension of the crescent
to form a nearly complete ring was remarkable on
June 4, while nearly invisible on June 2. Another
interesting observation is the limb brightening
in Venus's southern hemisphere between 50° to 70°
latitude. For confirmation, I obtained a second
image using a W25 filter (red) that shows the presence
of the brightening in the same way."
more images: from
Tobias Kampschulte of Gennadi, Rhodes, Greece;
from
Steve Miller of Lake Havasu City, Arizona: from
Antonios Pantelidis of Florina, Greece; from
Rob of Liverpool, UK; from
Elias Chasiotis of Markopoulo, Greece; from
Pavol Rapavy of Observatory Rimavska Sobota,
Slovakia; from
Ernie Mastroianni of Milwaukee, Wisconsin; from
Joe Mcbride of Grand Rapids, Michigan
Potentially Hazardous Asteroids ( PHAs)
are space rocks larger than approximately 100m that
can come closer to Earth than 0.05 AU. None of the
known PHAs is on a collision course with our planet,
although astronomers are finding new
ones all the time.
On
June 5, 2012 there were 1293
potentially hazardous asteroids.
Notes: LD means
"Lunar Distance." 1 LD = 384,401 km, the distance
between Earth and the Moon. 1 LD also equals 0.00256
AU. MAG is the visual magnitude of the asteroid on
the date of closest approach.
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The
official U.S. government space weather bureau |
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The
first place to look for information about sundogs,
pillars, rainbows and related phenomena. |
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Researchers
call it a "Hubble for the sun." SDO
is the most advanced solar observatory ever. |
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3D
views of the sun from NASA's Solar and Terrestrial
Relations Observatory |
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Realtime
and archival images of the Sun from SOHO. |
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from
the NOAA Space Environment Center |
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the
underlying science of space weather |
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