The Transit of Venus

On 2004 June 8, an event so rare that it occurs at most twice in a lifetime occurred. The planet Venus crossed directly in front of the Sun. I had first read about it in the 1950s in a library book that I checked out from the grammar school that I was going to as a boy. During this transit, which lasts six hours, Venus appears as a dot in front of the Sun. I went to the Science Museum of Virginia to observe the event, which was televised on Channel 12. It was one of the most ethereal events I have seen. There was fog that morning, heavy enough to interfere with driving in some places. The sun rose, husklike and dull, above a building in the distance. We could see the sun and notice with the naked eye a dot on one side, but I could not get it in the telescope, because that requires a filter so dark that it renders the brightness of the Sun viewable through a telescope. Later, it began to shine after the fog and clouds cleared a bit and I was able to get it into the telescope. It was quite a sight. I took pictures of it, one of which is on my Astronomy Scrapbook web page. We observed it until Venus reached the edge of the Sun. Then the clouds became so thick that we could not see the Sun at all. By the time my neighbor got it back in his telescope, Venus was gone.

If you missed it the past week, you have another chance in 2012, at about the same date, June 6. This is 8 Earth years or 13 Venus years from now, almost exactly. Therefore, Venus and Earth are nearly back to where they were, but this time the planet crosses the top of the disk, not the bottom. They come back in 2020, but by this time Venus' orbit has wandered so much that it does not cross the Sun any more, so no transit occurs. Then we have to wait until December of 2117. So this is truly a rare event, and I was glad that I saw it.