dipper@utastro.UUCP (Debbie Byrd) (06/16/85)
You may be able to see a very old moon Monday morning. More -- after this. June 16 The Old Moon This past week, the moon has been in the east before dawn. It has been visible as a waning crescent -- closer to the sunrise with the break of each new day. Now the moon is about to disappear from the eastern predawn sky. It's about to cross that imaginary line between the Earth and sun -- as the moon moves in its own orbit around the Earth. When the moon is between the Earth and sun, we say it's a new moon. New moon starts the lunar cycle over again each month. Most of us will see the moon next on the other side of the imaginary Earth/sun line -- as a waxing crescent visible in the west soon after sunset. But careful observers may be able to spot the moon one last time before dawn this month. To see it on Monday morning, you'd need a very clear view of the east -- with no clouds -- and no buildings or trees. The moon will rise Monday morning only shortly before the sun. It'll be the slimmest imaginable crescent -- a ghost of a crescent in an eastern sky already washed with the light of dawn. When you see it later on this week, in the west after the sun goes down, the crescent moon will be what people call a "young" moon. But tomorrow's slim crescent -- possibly visible to careful observers looking toward the east before dawn -- is called an "old" moon. If you want to see it, be sure to look toward an unobstructed eastern horizon. And if you've got binoculars, use them. Script by Deborah Byrd. (c) Copyright 1984, 1985 McDonald Observatory, University of Texas at Austin