Moon Occults Venus
Image Credit & Copyright:
Dzmitry Kananovich
It may look like
Earthrise, but it's actually Venus-set.
Just after sunrise two days ago, both the Moon and Venus also
rose.
But then the Moon overtook
Venus.
In the
featured image sequence
centered on the Moon, Venus is shown increasingly angularly
close to the Moon.
In the
famous Earthrise image taken just over 50 years ago,
the Earth was captured rising over the edge of the Moon, as seen from the
Apollo 8
crew orbiting the Moon.
This similar Venus-set image was taken from Earth, of course, specifically
Estonia.
Venus shows only a thin crescent because last week it passed
nearly in front of the Sun, as seen from Earth.
The Moon shows only a
thin crescent
because it will soon be passing directly in front of the
Sun, as seen from Earth.
Today, in fact, two days after this image was taken, the Moon
will create a solar eclipse, with a thin swath across the Earth treated to an
annular solar eclipse.