Occultation of Saturn by the Moon: 16 April 2002This occultation may prove to be the most beautiful event of the current series of occultations of the "Gas Giants." Indeed, with this one, the series of night time occultations of the two planets comes to an end. The occultation occurs at a convenient hour in the evening with the Moon a beautiful, waxing, 4 day old crescent in the western sky, The view will be further enhanced by the presence of "Earthshine" on the dark limb and as a visual spectacle, it will be hard to beat. Saturn lies in the constellation of Taurus, just to the north of The Hyades. Its visual magnitude is +0.3. As almost all of the UK will be able to witness the occultation, I do hope that you will be able to go out and observe it against a clear sky and maybe try your hand at some amateur astrophotography. Remember though, that even a quick sketch of what you are able to see is just as valuable, if not more so, and is much more satisfying! Please note also, that because Saturn's largest satellite, Titan, is preceding the planet ( i.e. lies to the west of it), Titan will be occulted some 5 minutes before Saturn. Why not try and get an accurate timing of this interval? The visual magnitude of Titan is +8.3 and is easily visible in amateur telescopes. There is one part of England that misses out unfortunately, and that is the extreme south-west ( see the accompanying graphic). However, the graze line cuts across Cornwall and Devon and the residents of those parts will see the ringed planet, apparently sliding along the lunar limb. The southern limit of the occultation, below, which an extremely close appulse will be seen, runs from Padstow to Rame Head, just to the SSW of Plymouth. The Northern limit of the graze crosses the peninsula from Bude to Teignmouth. North of this line, a full occultation may be seen, of longer duration the further north you are. From the City of Plymouth, about 15% of Saturn should disappear behind the southern limb of the moon. The next occultation of Saturn is on May 14 but it takes place
in daylight and no great distance from the Sun, so will be impossible
to see. There is a further daylight occultation on December 10
, 2006 , but it is not until March 2, 2007 at 02h 21m UT that
we, in the UK, will have the opportunity to see Saturn disappear
behind the moon again ! The times for the occultation of Saturn
at different locations, in the UK are as follows: Please note
that the times given below are in UNIVERSAL TIME. You must ADD 1 hour therefore in order to convert to Local (BST) Time. Click
on images to enlarge! GREENWICH: Disappearance of Saturn at the Moon's dark limb (DD) 21h 00m
23s UT Jon Harper Click on images below to view full-size |
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 The scene is set for the last occultation of Saturn in the present series. The 4 day old waxing crescent moon, showing "Earthshine" lies just to the west of Saturn at 20h.45 UT. |
 Titan at magnitude +8.3 about to be occulted by the moon's dark limb 5 minutes before Saturn. |
 Saturn begins to slide behind the moon as the occultation begins. The two objects are just under 20 degrees altitude in the west. |
 Saturn reappears from behind the cratered highlands of the lunar SSE limb. |
 Map showing the Grazing Zone of April's lunar occultation of Saturn. |
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Last modified 15 February, 2002