The Moon and the stars — July 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)

14 occultations you can see from New Delhi with small telescope (80 mm) this month, on 10 nights · 1102 in all from there

Mon

Tue

Wed

Thu

Fri

Sat

Sun

1 5

2 16

3 17

2 18

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 Tue 4 Jul

1
02:03:36 HIP 84478 V 6.3
Disappears at the dark limb
17° up in the SW · dark sky · PA 91° · cusp 85°

Night of Wed 5 Jul

1
00:32:36 HIP 89097 V 6.8
Disappears at the dark limb
34° up in the SSW · dark sky · PA 30° · cusp 43°

Night of Mon 10 Jul

1
22:43:28 θ Aqr V 4.3
Reappears at the dark limb
14° up in the ESE · dark sky · PA 246° · cusp 90°

Night of Sat 15 Jul

1
02:54:27 HIP 9777 V 8.2
Reappears at the dark limb
35° up in the E · dark sky · PA 242° · cusp 81°
2
04:21:22 Gaia …9086848 V 6.6
Reappears at the dark limb
54° up in the E · dark sky · PA 258° · cusp 83°

Night of Sun 16 Jul

1
02:56:13 ε Ari V 5.2
Disappears at the bright limb · reappears 03:51:38 at the dark limb
26° up in the ENE · dark sky · PA 97° · cusp 68°
2
03:58:07 HIP 13892 V 6.8
Reappears at the dark limb
39° up in the E · dark sky · PA 278° · cusp 67°
3
03:58:07 HIP 13892 V 6.8
Reappears at the dark limb
39° up in the E · dark sky · PA 278° · cusp 67°

Night of Mon 17 Jul

1
02:02:36 HIP 17923 V 6.8
Reappears at the dark limb
6° up in the ENE · dark sky · PA 276° · cusp 74°
2
02:23:56 HIP 17999 V 7.0
Reappears at the dark limb
10° up in the ENE · dark sky · PA 287° · cusp 63°

Night of Tue 18 Jul

1
04:09:19 Gaia …7061888 V 7.2
Reappears at the dark limb
20° up in the ENE · dark sky · PA 251° · cusp 74°

Night of Wed 26 Jul

1
20:36:32 HIP 59346 V 6.5
Disappears at the dark limb
17° up in the WSW · dark sky · PA 180° · cusp 27°

Night of Fri 28 Jul

1
20:29:50 HIP 68314 V 7.1
Disappears at the dark limb
30° up in the SW · dark sky · PA 135° · cusp 66°

Night of Sun 30 Jul

1
21:22:34 3 Sco V 5.9
Disappears at the dark limb
31° up in the SSW · dark sky · PA 86° · cusp 76°

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.