Dyer Observatory Offers Free Opportunity to View Planet’s Transit Across the Sun

Vanderbilt Dyer Observatory

by Home Page Staff

You won’t have to stay up all night to take in a rare astronomical event if you go to Vanderbilt Dyer Observatory the morning of Monday, May 9.

Visitors will have the unusual opportunity to safely view the planet Mercury transit directly across the face of the sun through Dyer Observatory’s solar telescopes, which will be set up just inside neighboring Radnor Lake State Park, a short walk from Dyer’s parking lot.

“Over the next 100 years Nashvillians will have an opportunity to see just nine of these transits,” said Dyer staff astronomer Billy Teets. “After this May, we will have an opportunity to see one in 2019, but then the next Mercury transit won’t be visible here until 2049. If the skies are clear enough folks should really take the opportunity to view this transit safely through one of our solar telescopes.”

Viewing will begin at 6 a.m., when the sun rises, and continue until Mercury completely passes across the sun around 1:30 p.m.

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