Venus crescent

A lovely sight this evening, just 7% illuminated -



Finbarr.

Beautiful blue; beautiful Venus -and all the more as a crescent!
Thank you, Fermidox.

The countdown is on.
How long more will we see herself?

Inferior conjunction is getting near.

Clear skies,

Aubrey.

And now down to 5%...

We might have clear skies on Thursday evening (16th March).
Bad weather is coming on Friday.

I am aiming to have a look at Venus.

Clear skies,

Aubrey.

On Thursday evening 16th March 2017, Dublin observers had experienced a very heavy shower at 5.30 pm.
I could see it coming on www.met.ie
However as soon as it was finished, we had blue skies everywhere. So I set up my William Optics apochromatic refractor.
By 6 30 pm, I had Venus in the eyepiece. It was a beautiful sight. The illumination was less than 3.8%. As its angular diameter was 57 arc minutes, the planet was very large at 167X before it descended into some dark clouds. But I was very pleased with the view -especially when the winds had died down very considerably. Venus' distance was 43.5 million kilometres. Which is about 27 million miles.
As my refractor has my north up, Venus appears to be smiling at me.

I wonder if I will get another opportunity to see its crescent once more, as the weather is to be bad for the next few days. Did anyone else get a glimpse?

Thank you for reading,

Aubrey.

Yes Aubrey, I think it's impressive how bright Venus remains even at less than 4% illumination, easily found in binoculars long before sunset. I've read elsewhere it can be followed right through this conjunction, as it passes a wide 8 degrees from the Sun on March 25th.