[X] My Assistant

[Stu]

Just to round off an already magical week, here in Kendal I've just been standing in my yard watching one of the coolest things EVER - Saturn passing behind the Moon in a rare planetary occultation. Started looking at 02.00, under a crisp black sky with the Moon blazing away right at the end of my yard, and Saturn was soooo close to the Moon's limb... minutes passed and Saturn appeared to draw closer and closer, tho it was the Moon approaching Saturn of course... just before 02.40 Saturn was touched by the mountain-rippled limb of the Moon, and started to slide behind it until eventually only half the disc and one side of the rings were visible... just a stunning, stunning sight... then the planet vanished altogether, and I had to stand there, shivering, waiting for Saturn to re-emerge... finally it did, and I tried snapping a few pictures with my digital camera held up to the eyepiece...

Managed to get one good one - well, I say "good"... it's no Cassini close-up, but believe me, I'm as proud of this as any of you Image Mages are of your mosaics, colourisations or montages...!



There'll be far, far better portraits of this event on the pages of SKY & TELESCOPE and on websites all over the world, but this is my portrait of Saturn, sliding behind Earth's moon, at exactly the same time as Cassini is orbiting it... kinda proud of that.