The celestial event of the Moon occulting Mars was observed and captured from the CFAL Observatory on April 17, 2021. The rare sight delighted astro-enthusiasts at CFAL as they curiously watched the crescent moon come directly between Earth and Mars, leading to a rare occultation. In the past few months, such occultations have occurred, but were visible only from certain parts of Earth. With the previous lunar occultation visible from Africa and South America respectively, Saturday’s lunar occultation was visible from across India.
It can be recalled that Telescope Observatory and Astrophysics Club at CFAL was inaugurated at its campus by Dr Prajval Shastri, well-known astrophysicist from the Indian Institute of Astrophysics in February with the aim of promoting
amateur astronomy through talks, classes, observations and discussions. The club also conducts evening and night sky observations regularly. The setup includes the Explore Scientific ED127 telescope with 2X Barlow attached to ZWO ASI290MC planetary camera. Students at the Observatory watched the Lunar Occultation of Mars live through the 10 inch GoTo Dobsonian telescope and photographed the same with their mobiles.
The video can be viewed at http://bit.ly/cfalastroclub_mars
More information on the CFAL observatory and Astroclub visit:
www.cfalindia.com/astroclub
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