APOD: 2026 September 15 – A Daytime Eclipse: Moon Occults Venus
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Astronomy Picture of the Day
Discover the cosmos! Each day a different image or photograph of our fascinating universe is featured, along with a brief explanation written by a professional astronomer.
There was something behind the clouds. Upon close inspection, it was the Moon , which was hard to see yesterday around noon above the small village of Cessy , France . But soon, it was not only the Moon . As expected, a bright dot suddenly appeared from behind the Moon — the planet Venus far in the distance. Captured in the single featured exposure , both appeared to show a crescent phase. The Moon’s crescent was quite slight — with only about 10 percent of its face illuminated by the Sun . In contrast, Venus’s crescent was more full — showing about 25 percent illumination. Venus appeared brighter because it is nearer the Sun and because its clouds are more reflective than the dark lunar surface . An occultation of Venus by the Moon is visible to only about 10 percent of the Earth , but in yesterday’s event even most of that was experiencing daytime .
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