Astronomy Picture of the Day -- Venus and Jupiter are Far

NASA ^ | July 03, 2015 | (see photo credit)

[SunkenCiv]

Explanation: On June 30 Venus and Jupiter were actually far apart, but both appeared close in western skies at dusk. Near the culmination of this year's gorgeous conjunction, the two bright evening planets are captured in the same telescopic field of view in this sharp digital stack of images taken after sunset from Poznań in west-central Poland. In fact, banded gas giant Jupiter was about 910 million kilometers from Poland. That's over 11 times farther than crescent Venus, only 78 million kilometers distant at the time. But since the diameter of giant planet Jupiter is over 11 times larger than Venus both planets show about the same angular size. Of course, 16th century Polish astronomer Nicolaus Copernicus would also have enjoyed the simultaneous telescopic view including Jupiter's four Galilean moons and a crescent Venus. Observations of Jupiter's moons and Venus' crescent phase were evidence for the Copernican or heliocentric model of the solar system.

[SunkenCiv]

[Credit and Copyright: Adam Tomaszewski]

[SunkenCiv]

Heh heh.

The Big One

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[Mr. K]

Is this picture backwards?

I know Venus should show a crescent and Jupiter should be ‘full’

But I think the crescent is facing the wrong way

[JoeProBono]

[Zuben Elgenubi]

lol

[SunkenCiv]

I don’t know, but Joe’s is. ;’)

[moovova]

I followed the link to the NASA "Astronomy Picture of the Day Archive", was reviewing some of the photos..and realized I'd missed the June 30th, Asteroid Day photo.

Naturally, there was a link to the AsteroidDay.org website. Their stated goal: "A global awareness movement to protect Earth from asteroid impacts".

http://www.asteroidday.org/ (WARNING: Fruitcake Alert)

[SunkenCiv]

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/chat/3305958/posts

http://www.freerepublic.com/tag/apod-chat/index

[Lonesome in Massachussets]

Viewed from the ground, Jupiter was on top, and Venus was underneath him. Just sayin’.

[Zeppo]

OK, I’ll play...

Why the “(WARNING: Fruitcake Alert)” for ‘Asteroid Day’?

[Zuben Elgenubi]

Ha! Good eye, I missed that.

[WKUHilltopper]

LOL! That’s a good one!

[JoeProBono]

[moovova]

Yep. Missed that one. Great pictures at the NASA website. I occasionally use them as my desktop background pic.

[moovova]

“OK, I’ll play...

Why the “(WARNING: Fruitcake Alert)” for ‘Asteroid Day’?”

You don’t think it’s a little over the edge for this group to believe they can protect the earth from asteroid impacts? Heck, maybe even WAY over the edge.

I do.

[Zeppo]

I interpreted their purpose as helping to build public support for early warning spacecraft that could detect potentially hazardous asteroids that might not otherwise be easily detectable from Earth until too late, not that they were going to protect the Earth by themselves.

[Verginius Rufus]

I read once that photos taken through a telescope, at least by astronomers, are often "upside down" because the process of inverting the image would cost some of the light or detail, and most of the time it doesn't matter for astronomers (the star looks the same rather right side up or not).

The last time I was able to see both planets was July 1. Jupiter was in the 2 o'clock position relative to Venus. Venus, of course, was the brighter of the two.