© NASA/Voyager 2

Neptune at solar conjunction

Dominic Ford, Editor
From the Outer Planets feed

Objects: Neptune
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The sky at

Neptune will pass close to the Sun in the sky as its orbit carries it around the far side of the solar system from the Earth.

At closest approach, Neptune will appear at a separation of only 0°09' from the Sun, making it totally unobservable for several weeks while it is lost in the Sun's glare.

At around the same time, Neptune will also be at its most distant from the Earth – receding to a distance of 31.04 AU – since the two planets will lie on opposite sides of the solar system.

Over following weeks and months, Neptune will re-emerge to the west of the Sun, gradually becoming visible for ever-longer periods in the pre-dawn sky. After around six months, it will reach opposition, when it will be visible for virtually the whole night. A chart of the path of Neptune across the sky in 2006 can be found here, and a chart of its rising and setting times here.

The position of Neptune at the moment it passes solar conjunction will be:

Object Right Ascension Declination Constellation Angular Size
Neptune 21h18m40s 15°50'S Capricornus 2.2"
Sun 21h18m 15°40'S Capricornus 32'26"

The coordinates above are given in J2000.0.

The sky on 28 Mar 2024

The sky on 28 March 2024
Sunrise
06:39
Sunset
19:05
Twilight ends
20:29
Twilight begins
05:15

18-day old moon
Waning Gibbous

84%

18 days old

Planets
Rise Culm. Set
Mercury 07:16 13:52 20:29
Venus 05:59 11:49 17:39
Moon 21:33 02:59 08:18
Mars 05:14 10:48 16:21
Jupiter 08:32 15:17 22:02
Saturn 05:40 11:21 17:02
All times shown in PDT.

Warning

Never attempt to point a pair of binoculars or a telescope at an object close to the Sun. Doing so may result in immediate and permanent blindness.

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

26 Oct 2005  –  Neptune ends retrograde motion
22 May 2006  –  Neptune enters retrograde motion
10 Aug 2006  –  Neptune at opposition
29 Oct 2006  –  Neptune ends retrograde motion

Image credit

© NASA/Voyager 2

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