Mercury Setting after Sunset

During the afternoon on Friday 1st November cloud and light rain, which had moved in since the heat wave and unproductive thunderstorm three days earlier, started to clear and produced colourful reflections of light from a bright Sunset behind Weirmouth, Mutare. What was notable were clear atmospheric conditions, lack of heat haze and no trace of the ongoing brightly coloured volcanic sunset twilight arch that usually appears after sundown and makes astronomical objects close to the horizon difficult to observe. This enabled the elusive planet Mercury which is now further from the setting Sun and has risen higher above the horizon to be recorded descending behind late setting sunlit cloud (see accompanying time-lapses). More details on the visibility of Mercury in the early evening sky at https://earthsky.org/tonight/mercury-after-sunset-greatest-elongation-east/

Tripod-mounted Panasonic Lumix DMC-ZS40 in sunset mode.

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