Venus at greatest brightness

Dominic Ford, Editor
From the Inner Planets feed


Objects: Venus

Venus will reach its greatest brightness in its 2193 morning apparition. It will be shining brightly at mag -4.6.

From Fairfield , this apparition will not be one of the most prominent but , reaching a peak altitude of 23° above the horizon at sunrise on 15 Jul 2193.

2193 morning apparition of Venus

01 Feb 2193 – Venus at inferior solar conjunction
04 Mar 2193 – Venus at greatest brightness
12 Apr 2193 – Venus at greatest elongation west
13 Apr 2193 – Venus at dichotomy
15 Jul 2193 – Venus at highest altitude in morning sky

A graph of the brightness of Venus is available here.

Apparitions of Venus

16 Apr 2191 – Evening apparition
05 Sep 2191 – Morning apparition
21 Nov 2192 – Evening apparition
12 Apr 2193 – Morning apparition
26 Jun 2194 – Evening apparition
15 Nov 2194 – Morning apparition
02 Feb 2196 – Evening apparition

Observing Venus

Venus's orbit lies closer to the Sun than the Earth's, meaning that it always appears close to the Sun and is lost in the Sun's glare much of the time.

It is observable for a few months each time it reaches greatest separation from the Sun – moments referred to as greatest elongation. These apparitions repeat roughly once every 1.6 years.

On these occasions, Venus is so bright and conspicuous that it becomes the third brightest object in the sky after the Sun and Moon. It is often called the morning star or the evening star.

Venus's brightness

Venus's brightness depends on two factors: its closeness to the Earth, and its phase. Its phase varies depending on its position relative to the Earth. When it passes between the Earth and Sun, for example, the side that is turned towards the Earth is entirely unilluminated, like a new moon.

Conversely, when it lies opposite to the Earth in its orbit, passing almost behind the Sun, it appears fully illuminated, like a full moon. However, at this time it is also at its most distant from the Earth, so it is actually fainter than at other times.

Venus reaches its brightest when it is still a crescent – with less than half of its disk illuminated. This is because it is much closer to the Earth during its crescent phases than at other times.

As a result, during evening apparitions, Venus reaches maximum brightness a few days after it is at greatest separation from the Sun, which always coincides with it showing half-phase (dichotomy).

Conversely, during morning apparitions, Venus reaches maximum brightness a few days before it is at greatest separation from the Sun.

Venus's position

The coordinates of Venus when it reaches its greatest brightness will be:

Object Right Ascension Declination Constellation Angular Size
Venus 20h21m40s 13°15'S Capricornus 42.5"
Sun 22h52m 7°11'S Aquarius 32'16"

The coordinates above are given in J2000.0.

The sky on 25 Nov 2024

The sky on 25 November 2024
Sunrise
06:50
Sunset
16:26
Twilight ends
18:04
Twilight begins
05:13


Waning Crescent

21%

24 days old

Planets
Rise Culm. Set
Mercury 08:30 12:58 17:26
Venus 10:15 14:43 19:11
Moon 01:23 07:34 13:35
Mars 20:42 04:05 11:28
Jupiter 17:13 00:40 08:07
Saturn 12:57 18:29 00:01
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.

Related news

28 Dec 2192  –  Venus at highest altitude in evening sky
12 Apr 2193  –  Venus at greatest elongation west
15 Jul 2193  –  Venus at highest altitude in morning sky
18 May 2194  –  Venus at highest altitude in evening sky

Image credit

© NASA/Ricardo Nunes

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