<html><head><meta http-equiv="content-type" content="text/html; charset=utf-8"></head><body dir="auto">Mike - and Brendan - I thought the same thing about what am I missing - but Mike after I just read your comment and scrolled down I too saw the second picture and it is beautiful!!! Thanks!<div><br></div><div>Patty</div><div><br></div><div><br id="lineBreakAtBeginningOfSignature"><div dir="ltr">Sent from my iPhone</div><div dir="ltr"><br><blockquote type="cite">On Mar 2, 2025, at 9:38 PM, Mike McCabe <cartech2000@yahoo.com> wrote:<br><br></blockquote></div><blockquote type="cite"><div dir="ltr"><div class="ydp5995afbbyahoo-style-wrap" style="font-family:Helvetica Neue, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif;font-size:16px;"><div></div>
<div dir="ltr" data-setdir="false">Brendan,</div><div dir="ltr" data-setdir="false"><br></div><div dir="ltr" data-setdir="false">So I'm looking at your first photo, and I'm like "what am I missing?"...then I saw your second photo...OMG, completely awesome!</div><div dir="ltr" data-setdir="false"><br></div><div dir="ltr" data-setdir="false">Mike M.</div><div dir="ltr" data-setdir="false"><br></div><div><br></div>
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On Sunday, March 2, 2025 at 05:34:36 PM EST, fiddledance <fiddledance@gmail.com> wrote:
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<div><div id="ydp339cec8dyiv8044590683"><div><div>I totally agree Mike. Last night was beautiful! I took this photo walking near the railroad bridge at the Cape Cod Canal. You can see the crescent moon through the bridge tower and Venus just above and to the right. A beautiful sight!</div><div>Brendan<div><img alt="IMG_9896.jpeg" src="cid:7Khp7RTNSALXlU2iwdsc"></div><div><img alt="IMG_9898.jpeg" src="cid:QQLIoVkE3j81gAjoXvI6"></div></div><div id="ydp339cec8dyiv8044590683yqt85669" class="ydp339cec8dyiv8044590683yqt7038406982"><div><br clear="none"><div class="ydp339cec8dyiv8044590683gmail_quote ydp339cec8dyiv8044590683gmail_quote_container"><div dir="ltr" class="ydp339cec8dyiv8044590683gmail_attr">On Sun, Mar 2, 2025 at 12:11 PM Mike McCabe <<a shape="rect" href="mailto:cartech2000@yahoo.com" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">cartech2000@yahoo.com</a>> wrote:<br clear="none"></div><blockquote style="margin:0px 0px 0px 0.8ex;border-left-width:1px;border-left-style:solid;padding-left:1ex;border-left-color:rgb(204,204,204);" class="ydp339cec8dyiv8044590683gmail_quote"><div><div style="font-family:Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif;font-size:16px;"><div style="font-family:Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif;"></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="font-family:Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif;">Greetings SSASers,</div><div dir="ltr" style="font-family:Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif;"><br clear="none"></div><div dir="ltr" style="font-family:Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif;">If, like myself, you ventured forth on Friday evening in hopes of nabbing that super-skinny crescent Moon sighting, then you probably experienced the same thing that I did - a thick haze being pushed up from the west by an even thicker bank of cloud cover, with exactly 0% chance of seeing anything out that way except for Venus. So much for the seven planets and any record-setting sightings of the Moon.</div><div dir="ltr" style="font-family:Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif;"><br clear="none"></div><div dir="ltr" style="font-family:Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif;">But last night around suppertime was a different story - at least intermittenty - where the slender 5% crescent Moon hung low in the western sky, with a hazy Venus just above and to the right of it. Like all young crescents it was a splendid sight, and while I did want to catch a snapshot of it the comings and goings of the clouds foiled that.</div><div dir="ltr" style="font-family:Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif;"><br clear="none"></div><div dir="ltr" style="font-family:Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif;">I'm a member of the Visual Astronomy group on Facebook, and today there was a post from a man named Dave Chapman from Nova Scotia, who did get to see the 22hrs Moon and got a picture of it:</div><div dir="ltr" style="font-family:Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif;"><br clear="none"></div><div dir="ltr" style="font-family:Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif;"><img alt="1740935222537blob.jpg" src="cid:vOFvHhj3FEHKEF8HAdb8"><br clear="none"><span style="font-family:Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif;"></span><br clear="none"></div><div dir="ltr" style="font-family:Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif;">Other folks from his region got to see it too, and it was notable that everyone who did also claimed to have not been able to see Saturn. There was no mention of Mercury in their posts, but that's probably because the speedy little messenger will only get easier to see over the next week or so, before it dives back towards the horizon on its way to inferior conjunction with the Sun.</div><div dir="ltr" style="font-family:Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif;"><br clear="none"></div><div dir="ltr" style="font-family:Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif;">Sincerely,</div><div dir="ltr" style="font-family:Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif;"><br clear="none"></div><div dir="ltr" style="font-family:Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif;">Mike M.</div><div dir="ltr" style="font-family:Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif;"><br clear="none"></div><div style="font-family:Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif;"><br clear="none"></div>
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On Wednesday, February 26, 2025 at 05:22:34 PM EST, Mike McCabe <<a shape="rect" href="mailto:cartech2000@yahoo.com" style="font-family:Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif;" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">cartech2000@yahoo.com</a>> wrote:
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<div style="font-family:Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif;"><div id="ydp339cec8dyiv8044590683m_-9115169589949735221ydp7cd57456yiv7924918266" style="font-family:Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif;"><div style="font-family:Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif;"><div style="font-family:Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif;font-size:16px;"><div dir="ltr" style="font-family:Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif;">...oh, please!</div><div dir="ltr" style="font-family:Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif;"><br clear="none"></div><div dir="ltr" style="font-family:Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif;">I'm sure you've all been hearing it too...the mainstream media enthusiastically bleating on an on about the "seven planet lineup in the skies these nights - get out there and see them!"</div><div dir="ltr" style="font-family:Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif;"><br clear="none"></div><div dir="ltr" style="font-family:Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif;">Ok, so <i style="font-family:Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif;">technically</i> there are seven planets in the sky at this juncture, and <i style="font-family:Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif;">technically</i> you could see them, but give me a break. These people are off their rockers but they don't know it.</div><div dir="ltr" style="font-family:Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif;"><br clear="none"></div><div dir="ltr" style="font-family:Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif;">To be fair the reason they're all hot on this lineup business again is because Mercury has entered the fray. A month ago anyone could go out in the early evening and easily see Mars, Jupiter, Saturn and Venus lined up from east to west. And if they had a friend with a telescope they might've got to see Uranus and Neptune. But at that point Mercury was behind the Sun and nowhere to be found. </div><div dir="ltr" style="font-family:Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif;"><br clear="none"></div><div dir="ltr" style="font-family:Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif;">So now? Mercury may have entered the scene but Saturn and Neptune have entered the solar glare zone, and both are dim enough that the likelihood of seeing them is in the single digits percentage-wise. Mars, Jupiter and Venus are still excellent - easy naked-eye and good to great in a telescope, and Uranus is still a viable target with optical aid, but the outermost gas/ice giant and the king of the rings have for all intents and purposes left the scene.</div><div dir="ltr" style="font-family:Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif;"><br clear="none"></div><div dir="ltr" style="font-family:Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif;">So does this mean we shouldn't even bother getting out there? Absolutely not!!! Mercury is a worthy target all by itself, if only because the vast majority of Earth's population has never knowingly seen the little bugger. You don't want to be in the vast majority, do you? Oh, no, it's much better to be special, and special you will be if you can knowingly steal a glimpse of the <i style="font-family:Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif;">Fleet Footed Messenger to the Gods</i>.</div><div dir="ltr" style="font-family:Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif;"><br clear="none"></div><div dir="ltr" style="font-family:Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif;"><img alt="1740606393728blob.jpg" src="cid:37nBZWhSi2XTwLzMt7jc"><br clear="none"><span style="font-family:Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif;"></span><i style="font-family:Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif;">This is the scene tonight at thirty minutes past sunset. Venus will be blazing high in the west/southwest, while much lower will be a trio of solar system members that are seemingly in a race to get to the horizon. Neptune, at magnitude 7.8 will be a challenge for even the most seasoned sky enthusiasts, and Saturn at magnitude 1.15 will be the next best thing to impossible to pry out of that solar glare. But Mercury, at magnitude -1.05 will be much easier - if there's no low hanging haze in that sunset sky.</i> <i style="font-family:Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif;">Binoculars will be your friend for this observation.</i></div><div dir="ltr" style="font-family:Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif;"><i style="font-family:Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif;"><br clear="none"></i></div><div dir="ltr" style="font-family:Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif;">Tomorrow night doesn't look very good from a weather standpoint, but Friday does and that day also presents us with a very special challenge.</div><div dir="ltr" style="font-family:Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif;"><br clear="none"></div><div dir="ltr" style="font-family:Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif;"><img alt="1740606963864blob.jpg" src="cid:es46HfRz8cHuonNr4vGG"><br clear="none"><span style="font-family:Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif;"></span><i style="font-family:Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif;">Friday evening will present us with an opportunity to nab a very special observation if the skies cooperate and you know what you're looking for. The new moon occurs on Thursday evening at 7:44pm EST (which is 00:44 U.T. - so if your info says that the new moon is on the 28th of February, that's why). The very young crescent moon will be hanging 4° below Mercury in the evening twilight sky. At under 22 hours old, this would be a record sighting for most of us. Very young crescents are notoriously difficult to observe, and there's actually a niche group of observers out there that chase this sort of thing.</i></div><div dir="ltr" style="font-family:Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif;"><i style="font-family:Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif;"><br clear="none"></i></div><div dir="ltr" style="font-family:Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif;">22 hours is nowhere near the record (for some reason 16 hours comes to mind), but to be fair we don't possess the types of skies that typically enable these observations. Sea level is a nasty place to try and find haze-less skies at sunrise and sunset, and it's a haze-less sky that we'll need to see this hyper-thin crescent coming up on Friday.</div><div dir="ltr" style="font-family:Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif;"><br clear="none"></div><div dir="ltr" style="font-family:Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif;">The logistics will be easy. Occupy your low western horizon site before 6pm on Friday afternoon, find Mercury in your binoculars as soon as you can, then put Mercury at the very top of the circle seen in your eyepieces and the ultra-skinny lunar crescent should be near the bottom of that field of view.</div><div dir="ltr" style="font-family:Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif;"><br clear="none"></div><div dir="ltr" style="font-family:Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif;">Good Luck!</div><div dir="ltr" style="font-family:Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif;"><br clear="none"></div><div dir="ltr" style="font-family:Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif;">Sincerely,</div><div dir="ltr" style="font-family:Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif;"><br clear="none"></div><div dir="ltr" style="font-family:Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif;">Mike M.</div><div dir="ltr" style="font-family:Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif;"><br clear="none"></div><div dir="ltr" style="font-family:Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif;"><br clear="none"></div></div></div></div></div>
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