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Ephemeris: 03/14/2025 – Viewing today’s eclipse from the Moon
This is Ephemeris for Pi Day, Friday, March 14th. Today the Sun will be up for 11 hours and 51 minutes, setting at 7:48, and it will rise tomorrow at 7:54. The Moon, at full today, will rise at 8:27 this evening.
I hope you had a good look at the eclipse this morning I don’t know if it was clear or cloudy because I’m recording this last Sunday night. One entity got a cloudless shot at seeing the eclipse without any obstructions. That was the Blue Ghost lander on Mare Crisium on the Moon. However, it was on the Moon so it was seeing a total eclipse of the Sun. I’ll be really interested to see the photographs coming back from that. There was a satellite and one lander, the Surveyor 3 Lander on the Moon that took pictures of the Earth during the solar eclipse. Of course, we saw a lunar eclipse. It just saw a ring of light around the Earth where the Sun’s light was being bent through the Earth’s atmosphere into it’s shadow to dully illuminate the Moon.
The astronomical event times given are for the Traverse City/Interlochen area of Michigan (EDT, UT – 4 hours). Times will be different for other locations.
Addendum
Sorry, I couldn’t spend any time on the program to celebrate Pi day, so I’ll give it a token appreciation here:
Update
Firefly Aerospace.
Ephemeris: 03/14/2024 – It’s Pi Day!
This is Ephemeris for Pi Day, Thursday, March 14th. Today the Sun will be up for 11 hours and 52 minutes, setting at 7:48, and it will rise tomorrow at 7:54. The Moon, 3 days before first quarter, will set at 1:47 tomorrow morning.
Yes, it’s Pi day that’s the Greek letter π for 3.14 approximating the ratio of the circle’s circumference to its diameter, which scientific and technical people celebrate by baking a pie P-I-E and carving the Greek letter π on the top.
Tonight around 9 or 9:30 when it gets dark, is a good time to use the Moon to find the Pleiades, the Seven Sisters star cluster. The Pleiades will appear above the crescent Moon this evening, so it’s a good time to locate them if you haven’t already. We only have about another month viewing the Pleiades in the evening. And we have one more passage of the Moon by the Pleiades next month before they disappear from the evening sky.
The astronomical event times given are for the Traverse City/Interlochen area of Michigan (EDT, UT–4 hours). They may be different for your location.
Addendum
There’s another Pi day that some celebrate. A well-known approximation of pi is the fraction 22/7ths. Europeans and others write dates in day/month order, so July 22nd is also a Pi Day: 22/7.
03.14/2017 – Ephemeris – It’s Pi Day!
Ephemeris for Pi Day 3.14, Tuesday, March 14th. The Sun will rise at 7:56. It’ll be up for 11 hours and 51 minutes, setting at 7:47. The Moon, 2 days past full, will rise at 10:04 this evening.
Welcome to Pi Day. I had some NASA inspired links posted on this blog this past Sunday for your enjoyment. Also simply do an Internet search for Pi Day and lots of fun information and activities will be listed. I remember an exercise in high school calculating pi with an inscribed polygon in a circle of ever increasing numbers of sides. Somewhere in there I messed up and came out with an answer that didn’t quite get there. This was in the years B.C. that is Before Calculators. Speaking of round things, Jupiter will rise this evening followed by the Moon and the star Spica in the east. They will all be up by 10:30. Jupiter is not yet an evening planet, since it is not up by sunset. It’s still seen in the morning sky.
Times are for the Traverse City/Interlochen area of Michigan. They may be different for your location.
Addenda
Had I known in the tenth grade this strategy to calculate pi, I could have saved myself a lot of grief. Simply google calculate pi with toothpicks. One of the hits was this from Science Friday: https://sciencefriday.com/articles/estimate-pi-by-dropping-sticks/*. Basically it’s by dropping lots of toothpicks on a piece of paper with parallel lines spaced the length of the toothpicks apart. The total number of toothpicks dropped times two divided by the number of toothpicks that cross a line will approximate pi. The more drops, the closer to pi one gets.
- In the formula in the link, if the length of the toothpicks equals the distance between the lines, those terms drop out of the formula.
Grouping of Jupiter, the Moon and the star Spica
Jupiter, the Moon and the star Spica at 11 p.m. March 14, 2016. Since the Moon moves eastward about its diameter an hour. So observers east or west of here will see the Moon in a different position in relation to these other two bodies. Created using Stellarium.
Pi Day fun
Tuesday is Pi Day (3.14) in American format. I received this email from Solar System Ambassadors Headquarters about educators, students and everyone else having fun with our favorite Greek letter:
From: Orr, Kim [mailto:Kimberly.M.Orr@jpl.nasa.gov]
Sent: Friday, March 10, 2017 10:59 AM
To:
Subject: Pi Day is Live!Hi all,
Happy Friday before Pi Day! Speaking of Pi Day, we’re now live with the following #NASAPiDayChallenge products:
- NASA Pi Day Challenge (MAIN LINK): https://www.jpl.nasa.gov/edu/nasapidaychallenge/
- “Celebrate Pi Day Like a NASA Rocket Scientist” Teachable Moment (for the science behind the challenge): http://go.nasa.gov/2m8VwpH
- Standards-aligned lesson: Pi in the Sky 4 (best for educator audiences): http://go.nasa.gov/2m8NrBB
- Share campaign: Pi Day: What’s Going ‘Round? (share what you’re doing for Pi Day): https://www.jpl.nasa.gov/edu/share/pi-day-whats-going-round/
- Twitter post: https://twitter.com/NASAJPL_Edu/status/840266573461958656
- Facebook post: https://www.facebook.com/NASAJPLEdu/posts/10158424974990397
We would, as always love any publicity, so please share like the wind. We’ll plan to tweet/post on early on March 14 with a link to the NASA Pi Day Challenge (https://www.jpl.nasa.gov/edu/nasapidaychallenge/). If you could retweet/repost us then, that would be great. For everything else, just be sure to use the hashtags: #PiDay and especially #NASAPiDayChallenge. Here’s a brief schedule of promotions:
- March 10: Promo lesson and teachable moment, focusing on educators
- March 13: Promo infographic/poster/downloadable products to general audience
- March 14: Promo NASA Pi Day Challenge to general audience, encourage participation in share campaign
- March 15: Ask for answers via social media
- March 16: Promo and release answer key
You can find all the graphics and promos in my exchange (kmorr/*PI DAY 2017) should you need them. They also include some incredible gifs made by Scott Hulme (check out the Mars crater one!).
Thanks all and let me know if you have any questions!
Best,
Kim
Bob Moler's Ephemeris Blog 