The Moon and the stars — April 2028

Lunar occultations of stars to magnitude 9.5, computed for your location

Every night the Moon slides in front of stars. A star doesn't fade behind it — it switches off, then switches back on at the other edge, often an hour later. Pick your place and what you observe with; the list keeps what you can realistically see.

Naked eye Binoculars Small telescope (80 mm) Telescope (200 mm)

27 occultations you can see from New Delhi with small telescope (80 mm) this month, on 18 nights · 1178 in all from there

Mon

Tue

Wed

Thu

Fri

Sat

Sun

1 5

2 6

2 7

1 8

2 9

1 13

2 14

3 15

1 16

1 19

1 27

Times in IST. A night runs from noon to noon, so an event at 01:30 stays with the evening before. On each Moon, the numbered marks show where on the limb each star disappears or reappears.

Night of Sun 2 Apr

1
19:58:07 HIP 32369 V 6.9
Disappears at the dark limb
68° up in the W · dark sky · PA 53° · cusp 49°

Night of Tue 4 Apr

1
00:43:00 HIP 43463 V 7.4
Disappears at the dark limb
28° up in the W · dark sky · PA 90° · cusp 76°

Night of Wed 5 Apr

1
23:21:57 HIP 47704 V 7.0
Disappears at the dark limb
54° up in the WSW · dark sky · PA 181° · cusp 16°
2
00:26:31 HIP 47880 V 6.9
Disappears at the dark limb
41° up in the WSW · dark sky · PA 172° · cusp 26°

Night of Thu 6 Apr

1
01:44:19 Gaia …4866176 V 6.8
Disappears at the dark limb
32° up in the WSW · dark sky · PA 148° · cusp 49°
2
02:54:48 HIP 52574 V 7.1
Disappears at the dark limb
17° up in the W · dark sky · PA 130° · cusp 67°

Night of Fri 7 Apr

1
19:49:21 TYC 4923-978-1 V 7.1
Reappears at the dark limb
38° up in the ESE · dark sky · PA 15° · cusp 1°

Night of Sat 8 Apr

1
22:56:12 TYC 5527-1965-1 V 6.8
Disappears at the dark limb
51° up in the SSE · dark sky · PA 108° · cusp 67°
2
03:11:58 21 Vir V 5.5
Disappears at the dark limb · reappears 03:27:28 at the dark limb
27° up in the WSW · dark sky · PA 41° · cusp 54°

Night of Sun 9 Apr

1
23:00:34 HIP 65235 V 6.8
Reappears at the dark limb
41° up in the SSE · dark sky · PA 320° · cusp 68°

Night of Wed 12 Apr

1
04:32:33 Antares (α Sco) V 1.0
Disappears at the bright limb · reappears 05:56:18 at the dark limb
33° up in the SSW · dark sky · PA 107° · cusp 86°

Night of Thu 13 Apr

1
00:30:58 HIP 84851 V 7.1
Reappears at the dark limb
13° up in the SE · dark sky · PA 318° · cusp 48°
2
00:42:12 Gaia …5480704 V 7.5
Reappears at the dark limb
15° up in the SE · dark sky · PA 350° · cusp 16°

Night of Fri 14 Apr

1
02:36:14 Gaia …7973504 V 6.9
Reappears at the dark limb
24° up in the SE · dark sky · PA 253° · cusp 74°
2
03:57:37 HIP 90128 V 7.8
Reappears at the dark limb
33° up in the SSE · dark sky · PA 222° · cusp 44°
3
03:57:37 HIP 90128 V 7.8
Reappears at the dark limb
33° up in the SSE · dark sky · PA 222° · cusp 44°

Night of Sat 15 Apr

1
04:59:10 HIP 94951 V 7.8
Reappears at the dark limb
35° up in the SSE · dark sky · PA 313° · cusp 40°

Night of Sun 16 Apr

1
03:08:06 HIP 99140 V 8.3
Reappears at the dark limb
17° up in the SE · dark sky · PA 237° · cusp 70°
2
04:35:03 HIP 99314 V 7.5
Reappears at the dark limb
31° up in the SE · dark sky · PA 261° · cusp 87°

Night of Tue 18 Apr

1
03:47:30 HIP 107127 V 7.9
Reappears at the dark limb
14° up in the ESE · dark sky · PA 239° · cusp 77°

Night of Wed 19 Apr

1
03:59:19 HIP 110780 V 6.8
Reappears at the dark limb
10° up in the ESE · dark sky · PA 200° · cusp 39°

Night of Fri 21 Apr

1
05:20:39 HIP 117858 V 7.3
Reappears at the dark limb
16° up in the E · dusk · PA 290° · cusp 53°

Night of Wed 26 Apr

1
19:32:03 TYC 1798-480-1 V 7.2
Disappears at the dark limb
12° up in the WNW · dusk · PA 81° · cusp 74°

Night of Thu 27 Apr

1
20:02:03 HIP 21103 V 8.5
Disappears at the dark limb
17° up in the WNW · dark sky · PA 135° · cusp 31°
2
20:21:11 HIP 21174 V 7.5
Disappears at the dark limb
14° up in the WNW · dark sky · PA 93° · cusp 73°

Night of Sun 30 Apr

1
21:44:50 HIP 36663 V 6.8
Disappears at the dark limb
30° up in the W · dark sky · PA 156° · cusp 33°
2
23:35:08 HIP 37084 V 8.2
Disappears at the dark limb
7° up in the WNW · dark sky · PA 61° · cusp 51°

Reading the list

The Moons are drawn from LRO LOLA topography (a 40 KB relief map), lit by the Sun as it is at that moment and turned to the Moon's real libration: north up, east to the left. A dark-limb event — the star vanishing into, or popping out of, the unlit edge of the Moon — is easy to see. At the bright limb only bright stars show against the glare. PA is where on the limb it happens, measured from north through east; the cusp angle is the distance from the nearest horn of the crescent. graze marks a star passing within 3″ of the edge from your place: a few kilometres from a graze line, where it may blink several times behind mountains.

Instrument	dark limb	bright limb
Naked eye	V ≤ 3.0	V ≤ 1.0
Binoculars	V ≤ 6.5	V ≤ 3.5
Small telescope (80 mm)	V ≤ 8.5	V ≤ 5.5
Telescope (200 mm)	V ≤ 9.5	V ≤ 7.0

Those limits are rules of thumb: the dark-limb limit drops by 2.5 magnitudes × (lit fraction − 0.4) in moonglare and by 1 in twilight; events with the Moon under 5° are left out, and daylight events except for the brightest stars. Stars are from Gaia DR3 to G 9.5, with Hipparcos-2 for the brightest and the Yale Bright Star Catalogue for names; the Moon is from the JPL DE431 ephemeris. Times are for the Moon's mean limb, ±2 s — mountains at the edge can move a contact by a few seconds, and much more near a graze.