by Anthony Ayiomamitis
The very young lunar crescent was captured from the grounds of the University of Athens on the southeastern outskirts of Athens. With a new moon predicted for June 22 at 22:35 UT+3, this image represents the moon's phase 23 hours and 45 seconds past new. Its distance of 358,118 km is extremely close to the minimum distance the moon can lie from the earth owing to its slightly eccentric orbit, thus making this sliver crescent also a perigee young moon. Due to poor transparency thanks to atmospheric haze and thin low-level clouds, the crescent moon could not be located using either binoculars or when looking through the telescope and, in fact, was not even visible on the camera's LCD screen when the photo was taken. Earlier calculations for azimuth and altitude suggested the presence of this very thin crescent from the proposed shooting location and which proved to be correct.
Lycabettus Hill ("Hill of the Wolves") lying at the center of Athens is approximately 280 meters high and is the highest of the seven hills which characterize the Greek capital. At the top of the hill, one will find the Church of Saint George and which is a very popular tourist attraction during summers for viewing the setting sun in the distance. The image below was taken from the grounds of the University of Athens and at a distance of 3420 meters so as to purposely match the apparent size (diameter) of the Church of Saint George with that of the setting new moon. The setting moon in the image below is just under 1.5 degrees above the horizon.
Technical Details:
Date: June 23, 2009 @ 21:35:43 UT+3
Location: Athens, Greece (37.9999° N, 23.7774° E)
Equipment: Takahashi FSQ 106/f5, AP 2x Conv Barlow, Canon EOS 350D, Baader UV/IR-Cut Filter
Exposure: 1 x 1.3 sec, ISO 400, RAW Image Format, 3456x2304 image size, Auto Mode
Further details: http://www.perseus.gr/Astro-Lunar-Scenes-Lycabettus-New-Moon-23hr.htm