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08 Mercury

08 Mercury

On February 26, 2019, I set out to photograph Mercury near its maximum eastern elongation. My viewpoint was to be a bluff overlooking an early segment of course for the Yukon Quest dogsled race. But with only the dim stars of the constellation Pisces near Mercury, I had no reliable night-sky signposts to guide me. And the lingering, high-latitude twilight kept Mercury hidden until well after sunset. Mercury finally came definitively into view at 7:57 pm, just before it settled in amongst the skeleton of a dead snag. The vista of the dogsled course winding up the Takhini Valley would have to wait for another time. Instead, a commercial airliner made a cameo appearance immediately above the faint star, λ Pisces. Capture details: Canon 5D camera on a fixed mount, 24-105 mm zoom lens set at 105, aperture 6.3, exposure time 1.5 sec, ISO 3200.
Category:Scenic
Subcategory:Night Sky
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