Today, I received this message from my colleague who is an astronomer:
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Over the next few nights, a spectacular conjunction of Venus and Jupiter
is taking place. By 30 June, the two planets will only be 1/3 of a degree
apart, easily seen in the dusk sky to the west.
In the realm of pure speculation, the editor of the otherwise sober
magazine Sky & Telescope said:
.This current trio of Venus-Jupiter conjunctions closely resembles a
similar series in 3-2 BC that has been suggested as the Star of Bethlehem.
As has been the case in 2014-5, the first two conjunctions back then were
extremely close, the last one separated only by 1 degree, all three
occurred not far from Regulus, and all were similarly high up in the sky..
[Regulus in the constellation Leo, is the brightest star in the ecliptic.]
See the following for more details. And take a look! It is spectacular.
Really. A conjunctions between Venus and Jupiter is not too rare and
happen every few years. But such a conjunction high in the western sky
near Regulus - that is not common. An occultation, when Venus passes
directly in front of Jupiter happens every 350 years or so. The next
visible one will be in about 100 years.
http://www.skyandtelescope.com/astronomy-news/observing-news/venus-and-jupiter-a-dazzling-duo-062520154/
http://earthsky.org/tonight/watch-the-great-race-of-venus-and-jupiter-in-june-2015
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I hope this information would be useful to some PDMLers.
Igor
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