Spot Venus pairing with Moon today

Sky gazers can catch a view of Venus close to a waning crescent moon in the pre-dawn sky Thursday. The bright and non-twinkling object, which will appear right below the moon before sunrise, will be the planet Venus. Vanita Srivastava reports.

Sky gazers can catch a view of Venus close to a waning crescent moon in the pre-dawn sky Thursday. The bright and non-twinkling object, which will appear right below the moon before sunrise, will be the planet Venus.

HT Image

The splendid pairing of Venus and moon happens owing to the celestial phenomenon called conjunction of Venus with Mars, says N Sri Raghunandan Kumar, secretary, Planetary Society of India.

Raghunandan says one will be able to notice the non-twinkling Venus below the thin waning moon at the east, from 5.45 am onwards on Thursday.

"Since the object spotted below the moon will be non-twinkling, it cannot be a star."

Though moon is far away from the Earth and Venus is even farther off, their geometrical placements will be such that they appear close to each other, says Raghunandan.

It is established that based on the journey of Venus around Sun, it would appear only in the morning sky or the evening sky. "From the end of 2012, Venus is visible in the morning sky. It will disappear from the morning sky soon and appear in the evening sky."