Bob Moler's Ephemeris Blog

Ephemeris for Tuesday, March 18th.  The sun will rise at 7:49.  It’ll be up for 12 hours and 3 minutes, setting at 7:52.   The moon, 2 days past full, will rise at 10:15 this evening.

On Thursday morning the 20th around 2 a.m. the star Regulus, the brightest star in the constellation Leo the lion will wink out for up to 14 seconds for observers in New York City.  That will be exceptionally cool, because Regulus is one of the few stars actually bright enough to be visible from that metropolis.  Regulus will not be at fault, but for a narrow band of the earth running northwest of there the asteroid 163 Erigone will pass in front of Regulus in an extremely rare occultation of a bright star.  This will allow observers on the ground to time the duration of the event and put together the silhouette of the asteroid, which is thought to be 45 miles wide.  Observers have in the past spotted secondary occultations of another asteroid and discovered an asteroid satellite.

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

Addendum

Part of the occultation path of Regulus. See link below. Credit: Geoff Hitchcox / IOTA and Sky & Telescope magazine

Here’s a link to the Sky and Telescope site with lots more information.  Clicking on their map will bring up an interactive Google earth map.