Transit of Venus 2012 in Pictures (Gallery)
By SPACE.com, 5 June 2012.
Venus Transit 2012: A Fiery Crossing
On June 5-6 2012, NASA's Solar Dynamics Observatory (SDO) collected images of the rarest predictable solar event - the transit of Venus across the face of the sun. This event happens in pairs eight years apart which are separated from each other by 105 or 121 years. The last transit was in 2004 and the next will not happen until 2117.
| 1. Venus Transit 2012 from Space Station |
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This image is from NASA Astronaut Don Petttit shot from on-board the International Space Station on June 5, 2012.
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| 2. Venus Transit 2012: SDO Close-Up |
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| 3. Venus Transit 2012 from Space: SDO |
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| 4. SDO of Transit |
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Image of the Venus transit across the sun's disk snapped by the Solar Dynamics Observatory on June 5, 2012, and shown in a NASA webcast.
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| 5. Venus Crossing the Sun |
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This view shows the start of the 2012 transit of Venus across the sun (upper left) as it begins to cross the solar disk on June 5, 2012.
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| 6. Against The Hellfire |
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The Solar Dynamics Observatory's AIA 304 camera delivered this amazing image of Venus over the active Sun during the first few hours of the Venus Transit.
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| 7. First Contact |
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The Solar Dynamics Observatory caught Venus at first contact with the Sun during the start of its transit.
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| 8. NASA's SDO Satellite Captures Venus Transit Approach - Bigger, Better! |
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| 9. SDO Up-Close Look |
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The Solar Dynamics Observatory captured this image shortly before ingress.
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| 10. Venus Transit 2012 Begins: Slooh Space Camera |
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This view from the Slooh Space Camera shows the amazing start of the 2012 transit of Venus across the sun (upper left) as it begins to cross the solar disk on June 5, 2012.
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| 11. Venus Transit by SDO |
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The planet Venus (upper left) approaches the sun for a rare solar transit on June 5, 2012. This image was captured by NASA's Solar Dynamics Observatory.
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| 12. Venus Crossing the Sun |
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This still from a NASA video shows the positions of Venus on the face of the sun at various stages during the transit of Venus on June 5, 2012.
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| 13. Venus Crescent Before the Transit |
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This picture shows Venus as a full 360 degree "crescent." It was taken about 30 hours before the start of the transit with Venus at an angular separation of about 2.3 degrees. The crescent was only about 230 degrees on 02 June. The full 360 degree ring is made possible by the scattering of sunlight in the atmosphere opposite the bright part of the arc produced by reflected illumination by the Sun. The image was obtained with the 76 cm Dunn Solar Telescope through a 50Å FWHM filter using the Italian IBIS instrument. The thickness of the arc is only about 0.5 arcseconds.
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| 14. Hubble Telescope and Venus Transit |
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During the transit of Venus across the Sun's face on June 5-6, 2012, the Hubble Space Telescope will be looking in the opposite direction - at the Moon. Hubble cannot look at the Sun directly, so astronomers are planning to use the Moon as a mirror to capture reflected sunlight and isolate the small fraction of the light that passes through Venus's atmosphere. Imprinted on that light are the fingerprints of the planet's atmospheric makeup. This is an experiment to see how well Venus's atmosphere can be studied spectroscopically, as a proxy for transit observations of extra-solar planets.
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| 15. Venus Transits: 2004 and 2012 |
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This still from a NASA video shows the positions of Venus on the face of the sun at various stages during the transit of Venus on June 5, 2012, as well as on June 4, 2004.
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16. Transit of Venus 2012 Diagram
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This diagram shows the predicted path of Venus across the sun's face on June 5-6, 2012.
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| 17. Venus Transit 2nd Contact: NASA Webcast |
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Venus fully enters the sun's disk in this view of the June 5, 2012 Venus transit from a telescope atop Mauna Kea, Hawaii, during a NASA webcast. Venus appears at lower left, a position created by the telescope itself. Venus was actually at upper left at the time.
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| 18. Capturing Venus Transit From ISS |
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This is a sample low res test image from NASA Astronaut Don Petttit shot from on-board the International Space Station on June 5, 2012. Petttit, who had the foresight to bring a solar filter for his camera, will be capturing the June 5 Venus Transit from the International Space Station with the images downloading in almost real-time. He will photograph through the European Space Agency-built "cupola", removing the scratch panes to get crisp, clear images.
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| 19. En Route |
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Venus begins to cross the sun at 7:30 p.m. on June 5, 2012, in a rare transit seen from atop Mount Mauna Kea, Hawaii, in this still from a webcast broadcast by the University of Hawaii Institute for Astronomy.
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| 20. Atop Mauna Kea |
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Another image of Venus crossing the sun from the perspective of Mauna Kea, Hawaii, at about 7:40 p.m. ET.
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