Second Place Prize

{OK, I swear that I posted this last night – the time stamp at this end says 22:03:10, 21-Mar-2015.}

Seeing as I wasn’t able to get to the Arctic or Faroe Islands to see yesterday’s solar eclipse, I’ve been admiring some of the awesome pictures from folks who were there. In particular, this one from Thierry Legault is completely mind blowing. (As are all of the others you can see on his site, the guy is just doing incredible work.)

There are a lot of great pictures taken from the air, from the ground, and even from space. Go forth and search for more and may your Google-fu be strong!

Please note that there are some fake eclipse images out there, some of which have been going around for years. (Nice artwork, but 100% fake.) If you’re going to go spreading fake images, at least make them believeable!

Meanwhile, if that was the gold medal astronomical prize for the week, tonight those with a clear sky got the silver medal for the second best sight of the week. With the moon just about forty-two hours past new moon (i.e., the eclipse), it was a marvelous tiny crescent at sunset, accompanied by an extremely bright Venus above it.

And apparently by sheer luck, a high-flying jet just about Venus.

These are hand-held pictures since I didn’t get home until late. Celestial mechanics being what they are, tomorrow evening (Sunday, March 22nd) the moon will have moved until it is very close to Venus. Perhaps not as spectacular as it was when Mercury, Venus, and the Moon all got together, but it should still be a great sight.

You get out your binoculars, I’ll see if I can haul out one of the ‘scopes, and I’ll meet you back here tomorrow.