1/15 second exposure, Kodak Kodachrome 100 slide film.
5" f/5 refractor plus 6mm eyepiece.
Occultations of planets by the Moon are always a facinating sight, especially when the disappearence takes place at the unlit lunar limb. When that happens, the planet seems to be getting slowly swallowed by nothing. With the introduction of webcams and digital cameras to astronomy over recent times, some observers are obtaining spectacular images of planets during occultations, such as during the occultation of Mars in 2003. However all of my images come from a much less technological era and so do not show anything like those more recent and technologically advanced images do.
In 1978, there was a report that there would be a grazing occultation of Jupiter across Western Australia. With eager anticipation a group of friends and I journeyed to the predicted location and set up to observe. However what we saw was Jupiter glide slowly past the Moon without being occulted! As we found out later, we were given the wrong location. We were told 10 km north east of a particular location, when in fact the graze path was 100 km north east of that location!!!! Since this event happened at around 1.00am and had involved a journey of around 170km, there was a bunch of very frustrated observers that night!!
In 1983 Saturn was occultated by the waxing Moon at a time that was well placed for viewing from Western Australia. I eagerly awaited this event as I had not seen a Saturn occultation before. The night was very clear although cold, but just as the planet was about to disappear, I noticed that there was a strange glow. I looked away from the telescope to see flames shooting out of the chimney. My wife had stoked the fire up too much. I quickly threw her the hose and told her to wet the chimney while I went back and photographed Saturn disappearing behind the Moon. Have to keep the priorities right....right? Once the occultation was over, I climbed onto the roof and finished putting the fire out. I missed reappearence due to a small cloud. Below is the only surviving photograph I have of that event. In it, Saturn is just about to disappear behind the Moon. The large, elongated crater is Struve.
In 1985 I was able to observe and photograph an occultation of Mars. Although the Moon was close to full, it was still facinating to watch both the disappearence and reappearence. In the first three photographs, Mars disappears behind the bright western limb of the Moon.
These next three images show the reappearence of Mars from behind the Moon. The dark floored crater near Mars is Endymion.
During June 1998, Jupiter was again occulted by the Moon. This event happened shortly before dawn with disappearence on the sunlit limb. Reappearence was not visible before sunrise.
Although of no particular scientific value, planetary conjunctions are always fun to see and can be a very useful means of reaching the general public with news about astronomy. Almost every year has a few interesting conjunctions so here are just a few of those I have photographed.
A pre-dawn view of all the naked-eye planets plus the waning cresent Moon. I just happened to notice this grouping while driving home after observing meteors all night, so I pulled over to the side of the road and photographed the sight by balancing the camera on the car roof. Unfortunately, I have no records of when the photograph was taken. It is most likely in mid-December and I had been observing the geminids. To the left of the Moon is Venus, while Mars is just rising in the twilight. To the best of my memory, then comes Saturn, Mercury, Spica and Jupiter.
During October, 1994, Venus and Jupiter were close together in the early evening sky. During the early part of the month they were joined by Mercury and on October 8, the Moon added its presence to the grouping.
The telescope in the photograph is the 6" f/15 refractor belonging to the Murdoch University. The blue glow illuminating it is comming from a mosquito trap mounted on the observatory wall. The Moon is the brightest object, with Jupiter just above it. Venus is the bright object to the left and Mercury is at the lower left, just above the fence.
Here the Moon is between Jupiter and Zuben-el-genubi. As the Moon set, I watched it through the telescope and it was quite a startling sight as the bushes came into view. The Moon remained stationary as the telescope was following it. However the bushes made sudden jumps towards it in the eyepiece. This optical illusion was caused by the eye not following the very slow motion of the horizon moving towards the Moon.
At one stage I had problems with the camera wind-on and it did not advance the film once. The result was a grazing occultation of the Moon by the Moon!!!
During November 14 - 19, 1995, there was a rare conjunction of the planets Venus Jupiter and Mars. Study committments kept me from photographing the conjunction as often as I wished, however I managed to obtain a few images, mainly when the planets were at their closest. In this photograph, the planets as seen over the 12" telescope dome at Murdoch Observatory, which is illuminated by the quarter Moon. It is interesting that Venus was also bright enough to cause a reflection from the dome.
By November 22, Mars and Venus were very close, but they had pulled away from Jupiter, which was rapidly falling into the twilight.
In 1998 Mars and Jupiter had a very close conjunction in the evening sky. January 21 was when they were at their closest. Att hat time they were less than 15 arc minutes apart and easily visible in the same telescope field. It made for quite a sight.
