Scheduled air date: 2001 Feb 19-25
Venus—our closest planetary neighbor—is currently making its appearance as
the "Evening Star." On February 21st it will reach maximum
brightness, after which it will begin to slowly grow dimmer. Toward the
end of March, Venus will disappear in the Sun's glare as it passes within
42,000,000 km (26,000,000 mi.) of Earth, re-appearing in April as the
"Morning Star."
Over the evenings of the 24th through 28th, the Waxing Crescent Moon will appear
to pass by the planet Venus, with the closest approach occurring on the evening
of the 26th.
(Shown about twenty minutes after sunset for mid-Northern latitudes.)
The Moon will continue on towards the giant planets Saturn and Jupiter,
appearing between them on the night of March 1st.
(Shown about an hour after sunset for mid-Northern latitudes.)
If you wish to view illustrations for other episodes, please see our Star Gazer Illustrated directory.
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Illustrations on this page were created using
TheSky Astronomy
Software, an advanced desktop planetarium program designed for Windows. Copyright © 1999-2006 by Software Bisque, Inc. |