Moons and aeroplanes......one of those "once in a blue moon event"

[[1ponders] (Paul)]

Many of us are familiar with, and still get a kick out off, having a satellite go through the eyepiece while observing . Even rarer and much more of a buzz is having a meteor go through the field of view. That's one of those experiences. Well yesterday afternoon, right on sunset, while the Earth shadow was that glorious blue against the pink in the east and that huge nearly moon was about 20 deg above the horizon, I was fortunate to have one of those other very rare experiences while looking at the moon.

My wife and I were sitting on the back balcony (insert silver spoon in mouth here) enjoying the spectacle of the near full moon (it really was a stunning sight last night) when I decided to get out my binoculars. The moon was lovely to look at framed by some large hoop pines growing on the next ridge over. Of course, as you can imagine, I was having trouble getting the binoculars back so I decided to set up my 4" refractor on my little EQ3 travel mount and poke my tongue at my wife and gloat over my better view . It's a great setup, quick as a dob to set up an nowhere near as awkward

I'd just finished setting it up, popped in a 20mm eyepiece, which gives a full globe view, popped my backside down in the chair and gotten comfortable, swung to the moon, adjusted the focus and was settling in for some pleasant viewing when what looked like a 737 flew across the full field of view of the moon. What a hoot It was one of those split second moments where you had to be in exactly the right place at the right time. The planes length appeared to be about 1/5-1/6 the size of the moon so by the time I'd exclaimed "Oh wow" it was over and my wife didn't get to see it . She saw the plane after but not during as she was looking at something else in the twilight.

It looked great. There was still enough light from the sun that high up that the plane wasn't a complete silhouette, you could still see colour and detail on the plane, thought for the life of me I couldn't tell you what company it was from, it was over so fast, but I could still make out dark spots of the window and engines against the fusillade and the windscreens against the nose of the plane.

It was a real buzz. Would have been a great photo opportunity.

Maybe next time

[iceman (Mike)]

Sounds great, Paul. I've seen some photos of that exact event, and they look just as wonderful. I imagine it can be predicted fairly accurately if you know the flight paths and moon motion at the various phases.

[BluMoon (Guy)]

I agree completly,I was lucky enough (one week after purchasing my first set of binoculars)!,the exact same thing.
Of course the magnification was not as high as yours,however my 15x70's were enough to bring on the "jaw drop"

[andrew]

Sounds like a great experience to see, did it look like this? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1YiOSKCMSe4

[astroron (Ron)]

On quite a few occasions over the years I have seen flocks of birds fly in front of the moon at all hours of the night through the 16", Quite awe inspiring

[[1ponders] (Paul)]

Now that looked pretty cool even without the plane Andrew, but mine didn't seem to move anywhere near as fast as that, nor did it have the vapour trails. What was that it looked like a tomcat or hornet or some sort of fighter. It was travelling too fast to tell. Plus the magnification was such that I saw the whole moon in the field of view and the plane travelled almost exactly south to north.

The other thing I get to see pretty regularly are fruit bats flying across the face of the moon. That looks spooky.

[Robby]

This is the closest I have ever got to the plane/moon shot. In the early days with an 60mm refractor and handheld 1Mpixel digital camera.

[Astroman (Andrew Wall)]

I like this one too http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5dhTpX7SyI0

[[1ponders] (Paul)]

[andrew]

Originally Posted by [1ponders]

Now that looked pretty cool even without the plane Andrew, but mine didn't seem to move anywhere near as fast as that, nor did it have the vapour trails.

I didn't take that video unfortunately, just found it on YouTube