Few times a year, the Moon, rising behind the trees and buildings, can be seen from our home. A reddish glow of the sky is giving away exact place, where first rays of reflected sunlight will appear. As the Moon rises, it changes it's co lour, it's shape. It appears very large and "shrinks" rapidly as it rises higher in the sky. These few minutes are always very special and unforgettable, giving us some time to think about nothing, but the beauty of the Earth and the Moon.

Some time later it reaches the altitude, where the birds, the bats and the airplanes often cross the line of sight between my camera and the Moon and it seems so easy to catch them flying in front of the Moon, but is it? Not quite so. Birds and bats can be seen often, but they are too small and too fast and get caught on camera only by luck. The airplanes are more predictable as they can be seen long before they come close to the Moon, but it appears that they are even more difficult to catch! Sometimes it looks like the airplane is moving exactly along imaginary line, which will cross the disk of the Moon right through the center, but in last few seconds it becomes clear, that it's a miss: So

 

But sometimes I get lucky..

Later on, as the Moon rises higher, it becomes very bright and colorless - it's a time to observe and to photograph the craters along the terminator, the area between the day and the night..

More images to follow shortly

 

Moon & Airplane 2011-03-21

Equipment: Canon DSLR and 90 mm Maksutov Cassegrain telescope.