Venus Meets 14% Crescent Moon Monday, Passing Within 1 Moon Width

Q: Did you miss yesterday's rare celestial lineup, and when will the Moon, Venus, and Mercury align like this again?

Yes — but you have another comparable chance soon, though not an exact repeat. The Sept. 13 lineup was a brief twilight event: the crescent Moon, Venus, Mercury and Spica appeared low in the western sky, with Mercury especially hard to catch because it set less than 40 minutes after sunset. If you missed it, the closest follow-up is the evening of Sept. 14, when the Moon and Venus are still close together after sunset, but Mercury will no longer make the same neat four-object line. For the specific trio of the Moon, Venus and Mercury appearing together in the evening sky, the next broadly reported similar alignment comes in mid-June 2026. Skywatching guides point to June 16–18, 2026, when a waxing crescent Moon again joins Venus and Mercury low in the western sky after sunset, with Jupiter also nearby that week. On June 16 the Moon appears near Mercury; on June 17 it sits close to Venus, and in some parts of North America and elsewhere the Moon even occults Venus in daylight. If you want the same visual setup as Sept. 13 — Moon above, Venus bright and obvious, Mercury very low, all arranged in a short diagonal at dusk — that exact geometry is not a one-night annual fixture. It depends on the Moon’s monthly motion and the slower changing positions of Venus and Mercury near the ecliptic. Similar scenes recur, but not with identical spacing or visibility.

Q: With the Moon potentially occulting Venus yesterday, which lucky regions on Earth witnessed this breathtaking cosmic vanishing act?

The Venus occultation on Sept. 14 was mainly visible from parts of southeast Asia at dusk, with additional visibility for the later stages from parts of Europe, the UK, northeast Africa and the Middle East. The broadest and best views of the full “vanishing act” were expected in southeast Asia, where the waxing crescent Moon actually passed in front of Venus in a favorable evening sky. Astronomy coverage cited that region as the main footprint for the occultation. Observers in the UK and much of Europe were less ideally placed. There, the occultation began while the Moon and Venus were still below the horizon, so only the final stages — especially Venus reappearing from behind the Moon after moonrise — could be seen in some locations. The same general limitation applied across parts of northeast Africa and the Middle East, where the event occurred under daylight or difficult horizon conditions. North America did not get this occultation view. Reports noted that for North American observers, the Moon and Venus were below the horizon during the actual occultation, leaving them with only a close conjunction rather than the disappearance itself. So the luckiest skywatchers were in southeast Asia, while some viewers farther west across Europe, the UK, northeast Africa and the Middle East could catch at least part of the event.

3 articles · Updated · The Guardian · Sep 14

Monday’s pairing puts Venus beside a little more than 3-day-old crescent moon, still close enough by evening to form a striking low south-west view despite their nearest pass coming at lunchtime.
UK observers face a timing challenge because the closest approach happens in daylight; by 6:30 p.m. in London, the sun is still above the horizon and Venus may be hard to pick out at first.
The safest method is to find the thin crescent moon first and use it to locate Venus nearby, waiting as the sun drops lower while both objects sink toward the horizon.
Southern Hemisphere viewers get the same conjunction higher in the post-sunset sky, while Europe misses the daytime occultation visible from some other regions.