Post by Chicago Astronomer - Astro Joe on Nov 24, 2012 15:13:22 GMT -6
Alignment of the Planets with the Pyramids...NOT
03/04 December 2012.
- STOP IT.... Just Stop it!! -
03/04 December 2012.
- STOP IT.... Just Stop it!! -
There is a pic going around the internets...about Mercury, Venus & Saturn aligning perfectly with the Pyramids in Egypt with some supernatural meaning and higher consciousness awakenings.
Now, I like a New Age story as much as the next guy...but this one is just silly at the least and damaging to real bonafide astronomy...
Aside that the "Alignment" will occur in broad daylight and totally non-observable naked eye, I guess if you crouch down and use your imagination and minds eye....I think you could sorta get the planets to line up with the apexes of the pyramids.
Let's see what is actually going on....
Before Sunrise on the 3rd (or 4th) of December 2012...Mercury, Venus and Saturn do indeed rise up in a more-or-less straight line in Chicago skies (about 42 degrees in latitude).
Here from Chicago skies...
This gathering of two or more celestial bodies is called a "Conjunction"...and not at all that rare. I happen to enjoy such gathering of planets...makes a pretty picture.
But, as the Sun rises...the planets are washed out in the solar atmospheric glare. The three planets are to the right of the Sun, but cannot be seen naked eye.
Let's move over to Cairo Egypt...(which is at 30 degrees in latitude) and see the same sunrise from their perspective - close to the pyramids...
The planets rise pretty much straight up and arc to the horizontal position near high noon...
...and set below the horizon long before the Sun does. At no time, do the planets hover above the pyramids - to be seen naked eye.
But, let's remove the atmospheric scatter glare and see what is going on with this conjunction....
At Egyptian sunrise, things look pretty much the same...
And at the planets highest position...about 11:00 am...
Nearing sunset....
...and at Egyptian sunset....
Now....adjusting for the way the Internet pic is displaying this "alignment", I have superimposed the pyramids with the planets lined up as we would see the event from the proper distance and Field of View of the naked unaided eye...
As one can see....it's a non-event.
Sorry....No match.
- Too high in relation to the Pyramids (wrong latitude) Try anywhere north of 60 degrees - Siberia, Finland, Alaska etc...
- Observer too Far in relation to the Pyramids - (You can line anything up if you try hard enough)
-Wrong colors to the planets
-Wrong position (upside down).
-And again...washed out in the bright sunlight.
The objects the graphic artist used in the fake image not of any planets, nor is it of the Three Stars that make up Orion's Belt, (which do make a nice representation with the Pyramids)....it's just artistic license with a paintbrush.
So...like the nonsense of the perennial "Mars as big as the Moon" or the "Huge SuperMoon"....
stop re-posting this non event on the interents....
