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[Centaur]

Who will be first to spot the New Moon by naked-eye after its conjunction with the Sun on 2005 Jan 10 @ 12:03 UT? "Sky and Telescope" magazine has a fine article describing such attempts in its February issue.

This slender young crescent Moon was traditionally referred to as the New Moon. On the day of conjunction it was called the Dark Moon. Most modern calendar makers, however, label the conjunction day as that of the New Moon.

Since I began this series in March within several astronomical message boards, the overall champion is DanielO in Michigan with a March sighting at 25:37 after conjunction.

Please report your January observation within this thread, including location and time with zone. Even negative results would be interesting. Photos would be especially nice. No prizes, just bragging rights.

I've created a graphic previewing the western sky 25 minutes after sunset on January 11 as seen from Chicago, although it should be useful for most North American observers. To see it, click:

www.curtrenz.com/astronomical.html

Then click the blue button for the January New Moon Contest.

The graphics may be removed soon after January 11.

[Centaur]

We have a January winner with a new record time (24:51) for the contest that I began in March and have been announcing on several websites. He is Navneeth (SN1987A) of Madras, India. This is his third victory month, although he has an advantage living in the tropics which provides a more advantageous celestial geometry for this event.

Nevertheless, I encourage American observers to look for the Moon tonight and attempt to set this month's Western Hemisphere record. It will be good practice for May when Mother Nature will arrange the geometry to give us the advantage.

Pasted below is the report that Navneeth posted on astronomy.com:

Hi,
After a few months of bad skies, I'm back at it again!

Here are the details...

Date & Time: 2005/01/11, 1824 IST (UTC + 0530 Hrs)

Location: Madras, India

Age of the Moon: 24:51

There was a beautiful colour display in the sky, by the sun, and some clouds too. I was waiting for the light to fade as the colours changed. A mixture of cloud and light wasn't very favourable, but when a small patch cleared up near the south west, the new moon was clearly visible. I think spotting (and confirming) the new moon hasn't been this easy in the past.

[Chicago Astronomer - Astro Joe]

We were shut out with the great Midwest cloud cover.

I say, since Navneeth has already caught three new moons, we encourage him to stay inside next month by standing by his house with pointed sticks, rusty chains and sour looks on our faces.