Our closest planetary neighbor, Venus, passed near the Pleiades, an open star cluster in early April 2020. This alignment was a stunning sight with the naked eye as well as with any magnification. Just this week Venus and our Moon aligned for another great show - if you had a cloudless view. A host of comets were also predicted to offer a sky show this year but two have fizzled as they rounded the sun. However, there is another promising ice ball (Comet NEOWISE (C/2020 F3) on its way and may be seen in the northern hemisphere during mid-July. We will see.
A total solar eclipse is something to behold. I have seen partial solar eclipses and thought highly of them, especially if the foreground had some interesting objects or the sun's surface had sunspots. This was my first visit to the zone of totality. It brought me to Fairmont, Nebraska where about 5,000 other eclipse enthusiasts gathered on Monday, August 21 to view the event.
The morning leading up to the eclipse was filled with clouds from a passing thunderstorm with periods of open blue skies. At totality the sky near the sun was mostly cloud free, which only accented the most wondrous sky event that I have witnessed.
Photos, films and video cannot do the totality event justice because of all the rapidly changing sky conditions, the crowd's reaction, and the grandeur of the what is being witnessed. To see the solar corona develop as the moon completely covers the sun is spectacularly unforgettable.
Do yourself a favor and make plans to see a total solar eclipse in person. For the US, that would be on April 8, 2024. I still have more photos of this event that I will post soon - more of what was happening with the crowds.
I thought I was washed out of seeing Comet Pan-Starrs tonight after five evenings of clouds. I didn't see the comet in binoculars, so I photo bracketed sections of the sky in hopes to capture it. When I studied the images at home there it was, the fleeting iceball in the upper left corner of this image. Photo specs: 13 seconds, ISO 200, zoom 82 mm, f/4.0, 8:41 PM CDT. Compare this image to my March 21st image (click here.)
Tonight Comet Pan-Starrs hovered above the orange colors of sunset just west of Fairfax, Iowa. The comet moved almost 16 degrees north in three nights of observations. Pan-Starrs is still located only 10 - 15 degrees above the horizon, roughly an hour after sunset and requires binoculars to see. Photo specs: 13 sec exposure, ISO 400, 97 mm focal length, 8:32:56 PM CDT. Air temp was 25 F with little wind - much better than the past two evenings. For the latest information including where to locate the comet click here.
