observations please

The good old"Ashen Light" again.

I read somewhere that it might be caused by perpetual lightening discharges,due to the eternal thunderstorms which rage all over Venus.

As Carl Sagan said "Think of Hell".

That's Venus.

Peter.

Fires lit by Venusian's to celebrate the election of a new ruler? That was one theory proposed in the 19th century to explain the Ashen Light

A new book I'm looking forward to is "The Haunted Observatory" by Richard Baum which is due to be published this month. It's a trawl through some of the more unusual nooks and crannies of astronomical history. Baum's previous book "The Planets: Some Myths and Realities" also touched on themes of a similar vein including the above idea about the Ashen Light.

Well done Dave on that image (and the Spaceweather scoop!)

All the best,

John

Try imaging a cresent moon for comparison.

Ah, that hardly compares! Our close proximity to the Moon does something 2-fold. First, because we are close, we easily see any ambient light. Second, because we are close, sunlight reflected off of Earth's atmosphere causes that ambient light.

If a webcam were able to capture it with a short exposure, it would be very obvious to the naked eye.

Dave didn't say how long the exposure was, just that it was overexposed. My guess is perhaps a 5 to 10 second exposure? Even at that, don't forget that camera equipment etc absorb light - the human eye doesn't. Also, we have the benefit of taking a large image like this and blowing it up for a nice big monitor screen!

Seanie.

Seannie just hit on something there. You know the way camera's can see a slightly different spectrum to us .... well ... maybe it's just picking up some of the heat from the hell that is Venus as small traces of IR?

Bart.

If uou cover the bright section of the planet with your hand you can still see thg "ghost" orb as plain as day.

It is not an optical illusion.

Peter.

Ah, that hardly compares! Our close proximity to the Moon does something 2-fold. First, because we are close, we easily see any ambient light. Second, because we are close, sunlight reflected off of Earth's atmosphere causes that ambient light.

It's not proximity that matters, but a difference in apparent magnitude.