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

Lunar occultation of Regulus

Dominic Ford, Editor
From the Lunar Occultations feed

Objects: Regulus
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The sky at

The Moon will pass in front of Regulus (Alpha Leonis), creating a lunar occultation visible from Northern America, Europe and 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.

The occultation will be visible from Fairfield. It will begin with the disappearance of Regulus (Alpha Leonis) behind the Moon at 21:50 EST in the eastern sky at an altitude of 29.7 degrees. Its reappearance will be visible at 22:07 EST at an altitude of 32.8 degrees.

The map below shows the visibility of the occultation across the world. Separate contours show where the disappearance of Regulus (Alpha Leonis) 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.

Map showing where the occultation is visible

Outside the contours, the Moon will not pass in front of Regulus (Alpha Leonis) 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)
Canada 02:23–04:07
Greenland 03:03–04:27
The Contiguous United States 02:22–03:39
Algeria 04:34–06:15
Sweden 04:17–05:12
France 04:07–05:40
Mali 04:59–06:10
Spain 04:08–05:47
Norway 04:09–05:04
Germany 04:18–05:32
Poland 04:27–05:28
Morocco 04:27–05:55
Libya 04:53–06:14
Italy 04:27–05:57
Great Britain 03:53–05:21
Mauritania 04:49–05:56
Belarus 04:38–05:21
Iceland 03:32–04:41
Finland 04:29–04:58
Russia 04:33–05:14
Ukraine 04:40–05:31
Romania 04:42–05:41
Tunisia 04:43–06:06
Western Sahara 04:46–05:48
Hungary 04:36–05:36
Serbia 04:41–05:46
Ireland 03:53–05:13
Latvia 04:32–05:09
Czechia 04:29–05:30
Portugal 04:11–05:41
Lithuania 04:33–05:14
Austria 04:29–05:35
Niger 05:14–06:15
Estonia 04:32–05:03
Denmark 04:17–05:14
Croatia 04:36–05:44
Slovakia 04:36–05:31
Bosnia and Herzegovina 04:39–05:44
Netherlands 04:16–05:22
Switzerland 04:25–05:35
Greece 04:49–05:55
Belgium 04:15–05:25
Macedonia 04:47–05:48
Albania 04:46–05:50
Bulgaria 04:47–05:46
Slovenia 04:35–05:37
Northern Ireland 03:56–05:09
Montenegro 04:44–05:46
The Canary Islands 04:38–05:37
Corsica 04:34–05:45
Faroe Islands 03:53–04:52
Mallorca 04:31–05:47
Luxembourg 04:21–05:26
Shetland 04:01–04:57
The Portuguese Azores 03:42–05:06
Aland Islands 04:28–04:57
Orkney 04:00–05:00
Menorca 04:32–05:46
Svalbard and Jan Mayen 03:51–04:29
Isle of Man 04:01–05:09
Ibiza 04:30–05:47
Andorra 04:25–05:39
Malta 04:50–05:58
Saint Pierre and Miquelon 02:53–03:58
Jersey 04:10–05:22
Guernsey 04:09–05:21
Melilla 04:32–05:49
Gibraltar 04:27–05:45
Vatican 04:39–05:45
Liechtenstein 04:29–05:32
Monaco 04:30–05:39
San Marino 04:36–05:40
Madeira 04:21–05:29
The Savage Islands 04:33–05:31
Isla de Alborán 04:31–05:47
Islas Chafarinas 04:33–05:49

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.

At the time of the occultation, the Moon will be 6 days past new moon and will be 95% illuminated. Regulus (Alpha Leonis) will disappear behind the illuminated side of the Moon and reappear from behind the unilluminated side of the Moon.

The position of Regulus (Alpha Leonis) at the moment of the occultation will be as follows:

Object Right Ascension Declination Constellation Magnitude Angular Size
Regulus (Alpha Leonis) 10h08m20s 11°58'N Leo 1.4 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
29 Nov 1961 26 Dec 1961 Occultations of Regulus (Alpha Leonis) 19 Feb 1962 19 Feb 1962
20 Dec 1961 16 Jan 1962 Occultations 12 Feb 1962 12 Feb 1962

The sky on 16 Jun 2024

The sky on 16 June 2024
Sunrise
05:17
Sunset
20:27
Twilight ends
22:36
Twilight begins
03:08

10-day old moon
Waxing Gibbous

78%

10 days old

Planets
Rise Culm. Set
Mercury 05:24 13:02 20:40
Venus 05:32 13:06 20:40
Moon 15:13 20:47 02:11
Mars 02:38 09:24 16:11
Jupiter 04:03 11:22 18:42
Saturn 00:53 06:34 12:16
All times shown in EDT.

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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Fairfield

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41.14°N
73.26°W
EDT

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