After a brief daytime look at the close conjunction of Venus and Jupiter on Tuesday, 30 June 2015, a monsoon storm, severe in some places, came through the area. Only 0.07" rain occurred at Cassiopeia Observatory. The sky remained overcast overnight, with another 0.02" rain, wiping out my opportunity to observe the closest portion of the conjunction, 20 arcminutes, after dark. I'm glad I got to see the planets that afternoon.

Overcast skies continued on Wednesday, 1 July. The sky cleared Thursday morning, 2 July, but by midafternoon daytime heating caused monsoon season buildups to appear. That evening I attended a meeting of the Oracle Dark Skies Committee.

After returning home from the ODSC meeting, Venus and Jupiter were fuzzily visible through the clouds. 2030-2045 MST: I took photographs using the D7200 DSLR. This f/3.5, 2 second, ISO 2000, FL 18mm, photo shows the clouds and the "double planet" in the western sky:

This f/5.6, 1 second, ISO 4000, FL 300mm, photo shows Venus (left) and Jupiter (right) through the clouds:

Mouseover or tap on image for labels

The labeled rollover image shows the Jovian moons Callisto, Io, and Ganymede in a magnified inset.

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2015 is the 10th anniversary year of my initial visits to "Oracle Observatory". On 2-4 July 2005 I was at Oracle Observatory with my LXD55-8"SC telescope to do some astrophotography with my still new D70 DSLR. The report from 10 years ago details that visit.

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