Categories: AstrophotosMoonSaturn

Lunar and Planetary Conjunction on August 21, 2012

Last night — if you were in a good location — the Moon, Spica, Mars, Saturn all came together in a lunar/planetary/stellar conjunction. My attempts to see it and capture it failed because of trees (the conjunction took place low on the horizon), but thank goodness for our astrophotographer friends! John Chumack caught the event from his observatory in Ohio (his specs: Canon Rebel Xsi 85mm Lens at F5.6, ISO 400, 1 second exposure) and Ian Musgrave captured the view in Australia, below.

The line-up of the Moon, Mars (top middle), Saturn (right) and the star Spica (left) imaged on 22 August 2012 at 6:45 pm ACST from Adelaide, Australia. Image taken with a Canon IXUS at ASA 400, 15 second exposure. Credit: Ian Musgrave

Want to get your astrophoto featured on Universe Today? Join our Flickr group, post in our Forum or send us your images by email (this means you’re giving us permission to post them). Please explain what’s in the picture, when you took it, the equipment you used, etc.

Nancy Atkinson

Nancy has been with Universe Today since 2004, and has published over 6,000 articles on space exploration, astronomy, science and technology. She is the author of two books: "Eight Years to the Moon: the History of the Apollo Missions," (2019) which shares the stories of 60 engineers and scientists who worked behind the scenes to make landing on the Moon possible; and "Incredible Stories from Space: A Behind-the-Scenes Look at the Missions Changing Our View of the Cosmos" (2016) tells the stories of those who work on NASA's robotic missions to explore the Solar System and beyond. Follow Nancy on Twitter at https://twitter.com/Nancy_A and and Instagram at and https://www.instagram.com/nancyatkinson_ut/

Recent Posts

A Space Walking Robot Could Build a Giant Telescope in Space

The Hubble Space Telescope was carried to space inside the space shuttle Discovery and then…

10 hours ago

New Report Details What Happened to the Arecibo Observatory

In 1963, the Arecibo Observatory became operational on the island of Puerto Rico. Measuring 305…

1 day ago

We Understand Rotating Black Holes Even Less Than We Thought

The theory of black holes has several mathematical oddities. Recent research shows our understanding of…

1 day ago

Habitable Worlds are Found in Safe Places

When we think of exoplanets that may be able to support life, we hone in…

1 day ago

New Glenn Booster Moves to Launch Complex 36

Nine years ago, Blue Origin revealed the plans for their New Glenn rocket, a heavy-lift…

1 day ago

How Many Additional Exoplanets are in Known Systems?

NASA's TESS mission has turned up thousands of exoplanet candidates in almost as many different…

2 days ago