Viewing the Transit of Venus

Astronomy enthusiasts will get a glimpse of a very rare sight this evening.  The planet Venus will run its course and position itself in front of our Sun to where we are suppose to see it on Earth. Known as the "transit of Venus", this twice in a generation viewing happens every 105.5 and 121.5 years.  We saw our last transit of Venus in 2004, so this means today's sighting will be the last one until December 2117.

The question is will we see it in Arkansas?

If the transit of Venus were to occur this Tuesday afternoon we might have a hard time looking for it with all of the cumulus clouds around.  However, looking ahead in the future the cloud cover will be less and the sky should be clear enough to see the transit this evening.

According to NASA, the transit of Venus will begin at 5:09 P.M. and will go on until the sun sets over the horizon at 8:19 P.M.

If you plan on trying to take a snapshot of it with your camera just be aware that you have to careful with your eyes - they could be damaged by looking at the sun for a length of time.  The safest way to view the transit is to construct a so-called pinhole camera.