Observers in the UK with a clear sky at dusk should try to locate Venus low in the western sky an hour after sunset. The 3-day-old slim crescent Moon acts as a convenient guide, located some 12½ degrees (or half the span of an outstretched hand at arm’s length) to the upper left of the brightest planet. Conspicuous star Aldebaran lies in the same low-power binocular field of view as the Moon too. Note that the size of the lunar crescent has been enlarged for clarity. AN graphic by Ade Ashford.Observers in Western Europe should make the most of fine weather to locate Venus low in the western sky an hour after sunset, particularly on Wednesday 18 April when the 3-day-old slim crescent Moon acts as a convenient guide, located some 12½ degrees (or half the span of an outstretched hand at arm’s length) to the upper left of the brightest planet.
Stargazers in the British Isles with a clear sky around 10pm this evening should note the Pleiades (Seven Sisters) forming a right-angled triangle with Venus and the Moon in the deepening twilight, but don’t leave it much later as the brightest planet sets around 10:43pm as seen from the heart of the UK (stated times are in BST).
Prominent first-magnitude star Aldebaran lies in the same low-power binocular field of view as the Moon too. In the small hours of 19 April, the waxing lunar crescent actually occults (passes in front of) Aldebaran as seen from central and northern Russia, north and eastern Scandinavia, the north of Greenland and northernmost Canada.
Ten days after a swingby to receive a gravitational boost toward its asteroid target, NASA’s OSIRIS-REx spacecraft turned one of its cameras back toward Earth, resolving its bluish home planet hanging in the void of space accompanied by the Moon.
At the beginning of civil twilight on Monday, 13 November, observers in Western Europe and the British Isles should seek out a viewing location offering an unobstructed view very low to the southeast horizon to see brightest planet Venus and largest planet Jupiter separated by little more than half the width of a full Moon.
NASA’s Opportunity Mars rover and Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter, working well past their expected lifetimes, could be shut down in fiscal year 2016 as the agency tries to balance funding for older missions and development of modernised new space probes, officials said Monday.
