Moon and Venus: Crescent Collision
On June 19, 2020, a special event awaits us that can be followed with a telescope in the daytime sky: The very narrow crescent moon covers Venus, which also shows a crescent shape. Successful observation requires a clear sky - and with a distance of only around 23 degrees from the sun, a lot of caution is required. Read what to look out for here.
Venus, our inner neighboring planet, is a hot topic in 2020: Its brilliant appearance as an evening star and its close encounter with the Pleiades in April and Mercury in May were highlights of the past few months - and the next interesting one Event is not long in coming: an occultation of Venus by the moon in the morning of the 19th. June.
In June, Venus will overtake Earth because its orbit is closer to the Sun than that of our home planet (see graphic on p. 54, middle). Already on June 3, it will be between Earth and Sun, in inferior conjunction, invisible in the daytime sky. In the weeks before and after Venus is quite close to Earth, which is why it then appears to us with an impressive angular diameter of around one arc minute. Even binoculars held steady with 10x or 12x magnification reveal their crescent shape, which resembles the waning crescent moon (see picture on page 69 below).
Soon after inferior conjunction, in the second half of June, Venus emerges from the deep northeast at dawn to meet…
