Bob Moler's Ephemeris Blog

Ephemeris for Monday, June 17th.  Today the sun will be up for 15 hours and 33 minutes, setting at 9:30.   The moon, 1 day past first quarter, will set at 2:15 tomorrow morning.  Tomorrow the sun will rise at 5:56.

Let’s take a look at the moon tonight.  The sun will have risen on one of the great craters  Copernicus.  It’s near the terminator, the sunrise line on the moon on the left, close to half way from north to south.  Copernicus was named for the Polish astronomer who put forth the heliocentric solar system in the 16th century.  The crater is 56 miles in diameter with a vaguely hexagonal form and two miles deep.  It has terraced walls and three central peaks.  It may look deeper than that due to the low sun angle exaggerating its depth. The asteroid that hit the moon to create the crater hit the moon’s smooth lava plains called seas, probably less that 1.1 billion years ago.  Many great photographs of it have been taken.

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

The Crater Copernicus near the moon’s terminator. Created using the Virtual Moon Atlas.