Photo of the Week for February 27, 2015
On the evening of February 21, sky watchers were treated to the rare sight of a triple conjunction that included the planets Venus and Mars, as well as the earthlit waxing crescent Moon, as portrayed in this lovely photograph by Rick Stankiewicz. He captured the scene in bone-chilling (–24° C) conditions from a location south of Peterborough, Ontario. The precise arrangement of the conjunction varied depending on when you viewed the trio. By the time darkness fell on the West Coast, the Moon’s rapid eastward motion had carried to a position above and to the right of Mars.
Stankiewicz used a Canon EOS 400D DSLR camera equipped with a Sigma 18-70mm zoom lens set to 36mm and f/4.5 for this 2.5-second exposure at ISO 400.
