Vatican City, Jun 7, 2004 / 22:00 pm
The Vatican Observatory at the Papal palace at Castelgandolfo is the site of a large congregation of astronomers this week who are in town to observe the transit of Venus.
An astronomical transit takes place when an object such as a planet passes directly in between to others. In this case Venus passes between Earth and the sun. Venus transits two times, eight years apart, every 130 years.
This is the sixth transit ever to occur since the invention of the telescope, the last one being in 1882. The next will take place in 2012.
Half of the 90 astronomers present observed today’s transit which occurred between 7.20am and 1.30pm. They are organized by the American astronomy magazine, Sky and Telescope.