This is a free open source planetarium for your computer that is highly customizable. Although there are many planetarium software choices available that range from super fancy (and expensive!) to bare bones, my favorite is Stellarium. Planetarium software is particularly cool because it enables you to simply click objects to direct your telescope to point at them. You'll see a celestial body move in real time across the sky as well as get a real sense of the distance between objects in our solar system.One of the most awesome features of modern amateur telescopes is that they can connect with a computer to allow control by a wide assortment of software. Uranus shows as a disk, so it will take several seconds for the moon to completely cover it. When the moon occults a star, it blinks out swiftly and suddenly because it's the tiniest point of light. At a magnification of 50x or more you'll see the moon's bright edge approach the tiny, pale blue disk of the planet. ![]() Maybe a couple hours before and again a couple hours after the occultation? Take a look and let us know.įor telescope users, it's wise to set up about 15 minutes beforehand, so you can identify the planet and get everything focused. How close to the moon you'll see it before lunar glare overwhelms the wee point of light, I don't know. ![]() Uranus is easy to spot in binoculars in a moonless sky. ![]() Normally, I write about things you can see without equipment, but this time you'll need at least a small telescope to see the moon, which moves slowly eastward as it orbits the Earth, approach and cover the planet.
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