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Venus Transit 2004 |
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Venus, just like Mercury, is closer to the Sun than Earth, thus, during inferior conjunction, it passes between the Sun and Earth. Usually it misses solar disk due to different inclination of its trajectory. But in rare cases can happen, that Earth-bound observer can really see Venus to cross the Sun - the phenomenon called Venus transit. In past, the phenomenon was used to measure the distance between the Sun and Earth - the astronomical unit. The last Venus transit occured in 1882! :–(
The next transit of Venus we can expect to see on 8th June 2004 :–). Details about this phenomenon with observational tips you can find on the webs linked below. WARNING! Observation of the Sun is dangerous. Pay attention to the pages about telescopic observation and naked eye observation please.
Observatory and Planetarium in Hradec Kralove joined the international network of institutions (both scientific and educational). The main goal of the network is to bring the information about the phenomenon and its (historical) concequences to the broad public. In the case of favourable weather we are prepared to offer near-real-time transmission (update in 15 min. intervals) of images obtained with our instruments. In the case of bad luck, we hope to use the data from other observatories in the network.
This is only informative English page. The main purpose of these pages is to inform Czech people about the phenomenon and the possibilities of observation. You can find detailed explanation links below, but in Czech only! If you are interested, click at 
Czech pages, because there are also useful images and animations. The titles of detailed Czech pages were translated into English here:
Other websites dedicated to the Venus transit 2004 (most of them in English):
Mirrors of this website: