Mercury easily seen in pre-dawn sky

[DippyHippy]

Hey

Thought y'all might be interested to know that Mercury is a very easy object in the morning twilight, about an hour before sunrise. I was driving home at 6:45am, headed south-east and there was a beautifully clear, dark blue sky above me. The crescent Moon was shining brightly and Mercury was unmissable, about 3 or 4 degrees above the horizon. Not sure of the mag, but I'd say easily into the minus figures.

The Moon is closest on the 19th.

Certainly worth getting up a little early for a quick squint :)

[damienpaul]

Is there any information of viewing Mercury in the southern hemisphere?

[DippyHippy]

Go to the Sky & Telescope (http://www.skyandtelescope.com) website and use their interactive Skychart planetarium thingy :)

[DippyHippy]

Ummm... I'm very embarrassed to admit that I don't think it was Mercury I saw at all... I have no idea what it was, but it looked like Mercury and appeared in the right place and at about the right brightness... the only thing is, after checking with some software, Mercury would have been too low to see at that time. But whatever I was looking at didn't move and I was able to see it pretty much all the way home. :wacko:

Actually, one hint about spotting Mercury is that it has a pinkish-white light and to be honest, this little star didn't have that. I should have realised. :unsure:

Anyway... it's still a good time to see Mercury if you want to look for it...

[Stargazer]

Originally posted by damienpaul@Jan 18 2004, 04:55 AM
Is there any information of viewing Mercury in the southern hemisphere?
Southern Sky Watch (http://home.mira.net/~reynella/skywatch/ssky.htm)
An informative site, updated every month, and easy to understand. :rolleyes: