The closest Super Moon of the year is the protagonist of the April sky, spectacular and bright in the night between 7 and 8 April. It is one of the many astronomical events that can be observed in this month, reports the Unione Astrofili Italiani (Uai), as well as the rare close encounter between Venus and the Pleiades, which is repeated in the struggles of April 3 at eight-year intervals .
That of April 8 will be a Super Moon, that is, a full Moon and which is located in the point of the orbit closest to Earth (perigee). It will begin to be at the minimum distance from our planet at 19:10 on April 7 , about 8 hours before the Full Moon, expected at 4:35 on the night of April 8 .
Venus will also show twice. It starts on April 2 , when it sets 4 hours and 7 minutes after the sun, reaching the period of maximum permanence in the sky. A show that will last a few weeks, because the planet will begin to approach the sun suddenly. Not to be missed on April 3 is his encounter, rare but suggestive, with the star cluster of the Pleiades in the constellation of Taurus. A conjunction that repeats itself, approximately on the same date, every 8 years .
Jupiter , Saturn and Mars will also take their place as protagonists of the morning sky. During the month the red planet will move away from Saturn and will be the last to rise among the planets visible in the morning, closing the trio which also includes Jupiter, the brightest of the three.
As in the previous months, the spectacular conjunctions between the waning crescent moon and the planets visible before sunrise, such as that of April 15 between the Moon, Jupiter and Saturn, or of April 16 between the Moon and Mars, continue. It will end on April 26 with many bright stars on the horizon after sunset: the Pleiades, the Aldebaran star, the growing Moon and Venus. To follow, concludes Uai, the evolution of comet C / 2019 Y4 Atlas , which could become visible to the naked eye.