Lunar occultation of Delta Scorpii

Dominic Ford, Editor
From the Lunar Occultations feed


Objects: Dschubba

The Moon will pass in front of Delta Scorpii (Dschubba), creating a lunar occultation visible from Africa. Although the occultation will only be visible across part of the world – because the Moon is so close to the Earth that its position in the sky varies by as much as two degrees across the world – a close conjunction between the pair will be more widely visible.

Unfortunately the occultation will not be visible from Cambridge.

The map below shows the visibility of the occultation across the world. Separate contours show where the disappearance of Delta Scorpii (Dschubba) is visible (shown in red), and where its reappearance is visible (shown in blue). Solid contours show where each event is likely to be visible through binoculars at a reasonable altitude in the sky. Dotted contours indicate where each event occurs above the horizon, but may not be visible due to the sky being too bright or the Moon being very close to the horizon.

Outside the contours, the Moon will not pass in front of Delta Scorpii (Dschubba) at any time, or is below the horizon at the time of the occultation. However, a close conjunction between the pair will be visible across much of the world.

The map can be downloaded in PNG , PDF or SVG format. A KMZ file , is also available, which can be opened in Google Earth to provide a higher resolution map.

A complete list of the countries and territories where the occultation will be visible is as follows:

Country Time span
(UTC)
Democratic Republic of the Congo 23:38–01:25
Sudan 00:08–01:25
Angola 23:37–01:18
Ethiopia 00:19–01:29
Tanzania 00:14–01:29
Nigeria 23:08–00:43
Zambia 00:08–01:24
Mauritania 22:06–23:34
Central African Republic 23:44–01:16
Kenya 00:18–01:30
Mali 22:18–23:53
Somalia 00:25–01:30
Mozambique 00:29–01:22
Cameroon 23:26–01:04
Chad 23:50–00:55
Namibia 23:56–01:05
Republic of the Congo 23:34–01:10
Ivory Coast 22:29–00:14
Burkina Faso 22:39–00:04
Gabon 23:25–01:05
Guinea 22:09–23:55
Uganda 00:13–01:27
Ghana 22:46–00:21
Zimbabwe 00:28–01:11
Senegal 22:02–23:36
Western Sahara 22:08–23:06
Botswana 00:20–01:03
Eritrea 00:28–01:20
Yemen 00:28–01:21
Malawi 00:24–01:24
Niger 23:12–00:04
Benin 23:04–00:24
Liberia 22:20–00:04
Sierra Leone 22:14–23:49
Togo 23:00–00:22
Guinea-Bissau 22:05–23:34
Saudi Arabia 00:31–01:11
Burundi 00:12–01:26
Equatorial Guinea 23:25–00:55
Rwanda 00:12–01:26
Djibouti 00:27–01:22
Gambia 22:04–23:30
Cape Verde 21:46–23:10
Sao Tome and Principe 23:18–00:47
Comoros 00:43–01:18
Madagascar 00:56–01:08
Mayotte 00:49–01:13
Saint Helena 22:39–00:15
Seychelles 00:42–01:21
The Canary Islands 22:25–22:37

Lunar occultations are only ever visible from a small fraction of the Earth's surface. Since the Moon is much closer to the Earth than other celestial objects, its exact position in the sky differs depending on your exact location on Earth due to its large parallax. The position of the Moon as seen from two points on opposite sides of the Earth varies by up to two degrees, or four times the diameter of the full moon.

This means that if the Moon is aligned to pass in front of a particular object for an observer on one side of the Earth, it will appear up to two degrees away from that object on the other side of the Earth.

The position of Delta Scorpii (Dschubba) at the moment of the occultation will be as follows:

Object Right Ascension Declination Constellation Magnitude Angular Size
Delta Scorpii (Dschubba) 16h00m20s 22°37'S Scorpius 2.3 0'00"

The coordinates above are given in J2000.0.

Next/previous occultations

« Previous Next »
Visible from the Contiguous United States Worldwide Worldwide Visible from the Contiguous United States
19 Apr 2041 16 May 2041 Occultations of Delta Scorpii (Dschubba) 10 Jul 2041 29 Apr 2078
19 Apr 2041 09 Jun 2041 Occultations 15 Jun 2041 07 Jul 2041

The sky on 22 Nov 2024

The sky on 22 November 2024
Sunrise
06:41
Sunset
16:16
Twilight ends
17:55
Twilight begins
05:02


Waning Crescent

49%

21 days old

Planets
Rise Culm. Set
Mercury 08:36 12:57 17:19
Venus 10:09 14:31 18:53
Moon 22:03 05:23 12:29
Mars 20:40 04:06 11:33
Jupiter 17:14 00:45 08:16
Saturn 13:02 18:32 00:03
All times shown in EST.

Source

The circumstances of this event were computed using the DE430 planetary ephemeris published by the Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL).

This event was automatically generated by searching the ephemeris for planetary alignments which are of interest to amateur astronomers, and the text above was generated based on an estimate of your location.

Image credit

The Moon in conjunction with Venus and Jupiter, with the Very Large Telescope in the foreground. Image © Y. Beletsky, ESO, 2009.

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