Cichus Sunrise Ray (as reported by Larry B Smith)

2/24/99: I was observing the terminator (20:00 EST) near the crater Cichus. Just to the south of the Cichus A crater (Rukl Chart 63) is a triangular depression. I observed what appeared to be a sunrise ray. The ray projected westward from the notch in the wall of the triangular depression (located at approx. 36.5 deg. south, 20.5 deg. west) onto the floor. Later (20:30 to 20:45) the ray broke up along the south-southeast side into jagged peak shadows (similar to the type of shadows that are easily seen on the floor of Plato). I video taped this area of the moon, to document what I saw, but the quality is not the best. See the digitized version at right. The ray may be seen clearly on the original video. I'm attempting to use a camera and the original video to produce a better quality picture. The telescope I used was a 12.5-inch Dobsonian.

The event took place on Feb 24, 1999 at 20:00h EST which is Feb 25, 1999 1:00h UT date and time. Bill Smith's approximate coordinates are 75.8W 40.1N. The preliminary ephemeris shows that the moon was +.520 rising. Even though this is a "no-name" area, the coordinates for Cichus A were used to refine the location for the predictions.

Site Longitude = +75.800
Site Latitude = +40.100


Feature = cichus a
Feature Longitude: = -21.400
Feature  Latitude: = -34.800

Reproducing Lighting For: 1999/2/25 at 01:00 U.T.

Desired Solar Altitude =  +0.520(Rising),  Azimuth = +90.095
Average Co-longitude =  22.034
In the Time column, D=Daylight, T=Twilight

                      ---- Moon's ----    -- Earth's --
                        Topocentric        Topocentric      -------- Sun's --------
   UT Date    Time     Alt°   Semi-Diam''  Long°   Lat°     Colong°     Lat°    Azim°

 1999/02/25  01:00   +69.115    973.65    +3.506  +5.637    021.773   -0.375  +90.095

No Description of Area - Wilkins and Moore, The Moon, Faber and Faber, 1955