Saturday
the Moon and Venus snuggled startlingly close together in the evening sky.
While the Moon is only about 233,000 miles (375,000 kilometers) from Earth, and
Venus is 80.9 million miles (130 million kilometers) away, the two objects were
nestled just 1 degree apart in our sky.
Amateur
astrophotographer Jay Ouellet took advantage of the conjunction to produce this
long-exposure photograph from the Laurentian Mountains in the Province of
Quebec, Canada.
Ouellet
took adantage of a phenomenon called "earthshine"
to reveal more than just the crescent of the Moon. The
bright portion of the Moon, be it full or crescent, is created by reflected
sunlight. But the dark portion can sometimes appear dimly lit when sunlight
reflects off Earth and hits the Moon, then is reflected back to Earth. The
effect is strongest when the Moon is a thin crescent.
--SPACE.com Staff
Credit: Jay Ouellet
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