You Can See this on the Moon Tonight with Just Binoculars

Tonight will be a great night to look at the Moon. Turns out tonight you can get a view of something that you don't get to see often and you will only need a pair of binoculars to see it. Copernicus, one of the Moon's most visible craters will be in eye shot tonight around 6 PM.

According to a Facebook post and an article from the Farmer's Almanac you will be able to see this crater on the surface of the moon simply by using binoculars. Of course if you have a telescope you will probably want to use that to see this piece of the Moon's real estate.

The Farmer's Almanac says we will be able to see this giant crater on the Moon also call the "Monarch of the Moon" right around 6 PM but you may need to get closer to sunset which tonight will be at 7:10 PM. The Farmer's Almanac actually lists it for about 6PM.

How you can spot this with only a set of binoculars is to look at what they call the terminator which is simply the line across the moon dividing dark and light. The physical crater is quite large and is named for Nicolaus Copernicus a Polish astronomer. Fun fact about Copernicus that the Farmer's Almanac shared is that the actual crater is 58 miles wide and 2.3 miles deep.

The Farmer's Almanac suggests that the terminator is a great place to start when looking at all features of the moon. It has to do with the way the light hits the surface and how the shadows react to it. When things are close to the terminator they are more visible due to lighting which is the case tonight with Copernicus.

According to the article there will be other nights to catch this particular feature on the moon throughout the year. The times vary the Farmer's Almanac had a chart put together by Joe Rao. Other dates are the Tuesday after Easter, April 6th at 6 AM, May 20th at 5 PM, June 4th at 6 AM and July 18th 3 PM. You can see the complete list of dates and times here.