Astronomy Buff

Awesome Saturn Occultation Mosaic

by Tony on May 25th, 2007

Earlier in the week if you were in Europe, you got to see this:

Image Credit: Johannes Schedler

On May 22nd, Saturn passed behind the Moon. This event was not visible in North America. The above is a mosaic taken from a 16-inch telescope. Outstanding work.

For those who don’t know, an occulation occurs when one object in the sky passes in front of another and ‘occults’ it. When the Moon does it, it’s called a lunar occultation, when a planet moves in front of a star, it’s a planetary occulation.

There’s a lot of people into timing occultations and reporting their results. Measuring occulations is an important and interesting field of study, in fact, measuring the light drop from a distant star as a planet moves in front of it, is the main method astronomers use to find extrasolar planets.

Here is a link to more info about this image from SkyTonight.

Technorati Tags: lunar occultations, moon, observing, occulation, telescopes

Share This

Related Stories

Saturn From Above
Saturn From Above In Living Color
Saturn is the Brightest it will be for Years
Saturn at Opposition
Saturn is Checking Out the Moon’s Backside Tonight

POSTED IN: Astronomy Porn