Bob Moler's Ephemeris Blog

Ephemeris for Tuesday, March 15th.  The sun will rise at 7:55.  It’ll be up for 11 hours and 52 minutes, setting at 7:48.   The moon, half way from first quarter to full, will set at 5:48 tomorrow morning.

The south part of the moon that can be seen tonight appears brighter than the darker areas that we call seas, that make up the face of the man in the moon.  These and other bright areas are called the lunar highlands, and are the most primitive surface of the moon.  Here the landscape is saturated with craters.  In binoculars the crater Tycho with its rays are just beginning to become prominent.  These rays, are thought to be small craterlets caused by the ejecta from the creation of Tycho which occurred perhaps less than 1.1 billion years ago.  This makes Tycho a relatively fresh crater in the moon’s nearly 4.5 billion year history.  A telescope will reveal more, including the large crater Clavius with its arc of smaller craters within.

* Times are for the Traverse City/Interlochen area of Michigan.  They may be different for your location.