Jan 30, 2023 | by Daniel Giamario |
The second Moon occultation of Mars in two months that is visible in the United States happens this Monday evening, January 30. The Southern part of the continental US and down through Central America are in the path. All of Arizona, New Mexico, and over to Florida. Even California south of San Francisco can view this rare phenomenon – even rarer to have it happen twice in three months!
This time, rather than a Full Moon, it’s a waxing gibbous. A -0.3 magnitude Mars will disappear behind the dark part of the Lunar orb and reappear from the lit side. The lunar occultation of Mars is actually the same astronomical phenomenon as a Total Solar Eclipse; just that Mars is too small to create the visuals of a Solar Eclipse, where the Moon and Sun seen from Earth are being almost exactly the same size.
The image for this post is taken (under fair use) from a great website, Stargazerslounge. The following link takes you there. You can find out your timings should you be in the path.
It happens about 8:30pm Monday evening in Los Angeles, later the further you move East.
https://bit.ly/Stargazerslounge
NEW MARS SEED POINT
As such, this occultation can be interpreted as a New Mars Seed Point. Possibly of a lesser order as back in December with a Full Moon, which was truly a Super New Mars, even including the start of the Mars Gemini synodic overstory, but nevertheless.
Regarding the December 2022 event, see my article about the Festival of The Red Swords here: https://turningoftheages.com/the-festival-of-the-red-swords/
MARS-ALDEBARAN CONJUNCTIONS
This occultation also includes the third of three Mars conjunctions with Aldebaran. The first two were on September 7 and December 25, 2022. Aldebaran, the eye of the Bull constellation, is currently located at 10Gemini05 longitude. Remarkably, at the time of the occultation, Mars and the Moon will be at 10Gemini06! Mars and Aldebaran are two of three “Red Swords” that figured so prominently back on December 7 for the Festival of the Red Swords, when the third sword, the star Antares, was conjunct the Sun.
MERCURY AT GREATEST ELONGATION
Another event of note happens in the morning twilight as Mercury reaches its greatest morning elongation. Mercury will be about 25 degrees from the Sun at 15Capricorn30. Although not its best morning apparition of the year, it should be pretty easy to spot. Mercury will appear quite far up in the Southern Hemisphere. I had quite a good view of it here at 14degrees North Latitude.
Meanwhile, stay tuned for the remarkable March events: Pluto into Aquarius and Saturn into Pisces.
My next Group Mentoring at the end of February will be themed around how these shifts affect you individually relative to your personal chart, so stay tuned for that too! https://turningoftheages.com/event/february-group-mentoring/