HISTORIC CELESTIAL EVENT

Since the planets Mercury and Venus orbit the Sun inside Earths orbit, they may from time to time pass between the Sun and Earth. On very rare occasions they may even line up with the Sun and the Earth so that they transit the Sun when observed from the Earth.

Transits of Venus are extremely rare - the last one was i 1882 and Venus has transited the Sun 6 times since the invention of the telescope in 1610. In Norway the phenomenon has not been seen since 1769!

	HISTORIC CELESTIAL EVENT On June 8, 2004 we will experience the most extraordinary and important celestial phenomenon in our lifes. For more than 6 hours the planet Venus will be visible in front of the Sun. No living persons anywhere on the Earth have witnessed this before! Actually, this will be the first time in history that everyone can follow the transit with their own eyes using eclipse glasses. The transit is expected to be seen by more people than any other celestial phenomenon ever! It will help scientists to find life on remote planets. More.
	THE DOT THAT CHANGED OUR VIEW OF THE WORLD Transits of Mercury and Venus have changed our view of the world and our knowledge of the cosmic distances. Transits of Venus also have tremendous importance of cultural and historic reasons. More.
	HOW ARE TRANSITS OF VENUS PREDICTED? In order to predict transits of Venus with great precision advances mathematics and powerful computers are needed. However, the transits are quite regular and surprisingly good predictions can be achieved by looking at statistics. More.
	THE NEXT TRANSIT OF VENUS The last transit of Venus occured in 1882, but they come in couples separated by 8 years. Therefore, the next one will come the night between June 5 and 6, 2012. It will be visible where the transit in 2004 is not observable. More.
	THE DISTANCES FROM THE EARTH TO VENUS AND SUN With the transit of Venus in 1769 the astronomers for the first time managed to determine a rather accurate distance to the Sun. The relative distances between several objects in the Solar System were already known. In 1543 Nicholas Copernicus published a work describing the closest part of space. It also gave a detemination of the relative distances between the Earth and the Sun and between Venus and the Sun. More.
	LAWS OF KEPLER DESCRIBE THE MOVEMENTS OF THE PLANETS In hundreds of years astronomers studied the movements of the planets with increasing accuracy. But it was hard to describe their orbits mathematically. We only see the planets projected onto the sky and can study their apparent motion between the stars. But it is not easy to observe how the planets really move around in space - towards us or away from us. More.
	IMAGES OF VENUS TRANSITING THE SUN IN 1882 These images are unique: Only very few images exist from the transit in 1882. The images taken in 1874 on wet bromiodplates no longer exist. In 1882 dry plates were available. More.