Photo credit: Andrew McCarthy
We’re still a few years away from wireless charging on the lunar surface, but astrophotographer Andrew McCarthy was able to capture this stunning image of the International Space Station crossing the Tycho crater during its Moon transit. He used a 14-inch telescope at over 4000mm of focal length to get this much detail from a remote location off highway 79 in the Sonoran Desert at 11pm earlier this week.
A transit basically refers to when one object crosses in front of another in space. This can occur in various ways, with one example being when the Moon passes between Earth and the Sun. In this image, we get a glimpse of the Tycho crater, which is named after the Danish astronomer Tycho Brahe and estimed to be 108 million years old. This crater was drawn onto lunar maps as early as 1645.
Here it is in real time, my view as it was captured. The laptop is hooked up to a camera on the telescope. I knew it was coming but still audibly gasped when I saw it. pic.twitter.com/OWPtLmZT4p
— Andrew McCarthy (@AJamesMcCarthy) January 5, 2023
These shots require meticulous planning because you have to be positioned exactly right or the station won’t pass exactly where you think it will. If I had set up my telescope on the other side of the clearing I was in, I would have missed it completely. It was only in the frame of this image for around 1/10th of a second,” said McCarthy.
