( Never look directly at the Sun, either by eye or through binoculars or a telescope, without a proper filter. Alternatively, you can use an unfiltered telescope with its lowest-power eyepiece to project an image of the Sun’s face onto white paper a foot or two behind the eyepiece. You'll need a telescope equipped with a safe solar filter to see it during the transit. Mercury is just 3,032 miles across, less than half the size of Earth, and its disk will be too tiny to see without optical aid. (* = transit begins before sunrise.) Time Zone Note that event times will vary by a few minutes depending on your location. The table below tells when Mercury's tiny black silhouette first touches the Sun's disk, the mid-time of the transit, and when the last bit of the silhouette leaves the Sun. For the rest of Europe, Africa, and most of Asia, the transit begins during the day and will still be in progress as the Sun sets. For the western U.S., the transit will already be in progress when the Sun rises. Eastern North America, virtually all of South America, and western Europe and Africa are positioned to view the whole show. (The Sun's diameter is 864,300 miles, 109 times bigger than Earth's.)īecause the transit lasts for several hours, most on Earth will be positioned to see at least part of the event. Given the current tilt and orientation of Mercury's orbit with respect to Earth's, this can only occur in May or November.Įven though Mercury moves fast in its orbit, averaging 30 miles per second, from our perspective the planet will take 7½ hours to cross the Sun's enormous face on May 9th. Mercury passes more or less between us and the Sun about every four months, but a transit only occurs when the planet passes directly in front of the Sun, as seen from Earth, rather than north or south of it. Astronomers call such an event a transit, and this will be Mercury's first since November 8, 2006. But something unusual will be happening: the innermost planet Mercury will be slowly gliding across the solar disk from about 7:12 a.m. The Sun won't seem any different as it crosses the sky next Monday, May 9th. It will be available on May 9th from 7:00 a.m. Note to Editors/Producers: Sky & Telescope is providing a high-definition video feed throughout the transit.
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