Fly Me to the Moons
Sometimes the Moon is a busy direction. Last week, for example, our very Moon passed in front of the planet Jupiter. While capturing this unusual spectacle from New South Wales , Australia , a quick-thinking astrophotographer realized that a nearby plane might itself pass in front of the Moon, and so quickly reset his camera to take a continuous series of short duration shots. As hoped, for a brief instant, that airplane, the Moon , and Jupiter were all visible in a single exposure, which is shown above . But the project was not complete -- a longer exposure was then taken to bring up three of the Jupiter's own moons: Io, Callisto, and Europa (from left to right). Unfortunately, this triple spectacle soon disappeared. Less than a second later, the plane flew away from the Moon . A few seconds after that, the Moon moved to cover all of Jupiter. A few minutes after that, Jupiter reappeared on the other side of the Moon, and even a few minutes after that the Moon moved completely away from Jupiter. Although hard to catch , planes cross in front of the Moon quite frequently , but the Moon won't eclipse Jupiter again for another three years. Reader Challenge: Hard: What type of airplane is this? Really hard: What was the flight number?