Venus transit

HIMALAYAN NEWS SERVICE

KATHMANDU: On the early morning of June 6, you will get to observe a rare celestial event as the planet Venus, the Earth and the Sun will align in one straight line.

Known as the ‘Transit of Venus’, this alignment as per Jayant Acharya, President of Astronepal , will occur when “Venus, while moving on its own path, will happen to come in between the Earth and Sun in a straight line”. And it is a “rare alignment” because it is the last opportunity in this century for you to watch this occurrence.

“Another Venus Transit will occur only after 105.5 years, sometime in the year 2117,” informed Acharya.

It means you must be a centenarian if you want to watch the transit of Venus in your lifetime again!

Astronomers have been able to watch this event “only six times after the invention of telescope” as per Acharya, who revealed the pattern of the occurrence, “Transits of Venus occur in pairs separated by eight years, followed by an interval of more than a century.” The last transit was seen on June 8, 2004. Other earlier transits occurred in 1761, 1769, 1874 and 1882.

People in Kathmandu can watch the transit of Venus from the sunrise — 5:09 am to 10:36:45 am on June 6. But the transit starts even before the sunrise, so as per Acharya, countries that witness sunrise before us will see the transit taking place on June 5.

“You will see a black dot-like shape on the face of the sun, and it will slowly move upwards from the centre of the sun,” Acharya

described.

The entire transit can be seen from countries like Australia, Japan, China, Korea, northern side of Canada and Alaska. Meanwhile, as the transit will have already started by the time the sun rises, people of Nepal, India, Sri Lanka, the Gulf countries and most European countries, will see it from sunrise till the transit lasts.

In this context, Acharya pointed out that the calculations of Panchanga Nirnayak Samiti “does not indicate the possibility of the occurrence of the Venus Transit”. “While the Sun and Venus should be on same degree on that day, their calculations show a difference of some six or seven degrees, which means there is no possibility of Venus transit. And I feel the calculations are not correct and need to be revised,” claimed Acharya.

To this Surya Prasad Dhungel, Secretary of Panchanga Nirnayak Samiti defended, “We do calculations based on Suryamat Siddhanta and have been making timely reformations as well. There might be slight differences while doing calculations from this principle, which is closely associated with religion. And we can’t change it

instantly.”