The Moon and the Seven Sisters

The Moon orbits the Earth about once a month. As it does so, it sometimes passes directly over (occludes) bright stars and, rarely, planets. It's a fun event to observe, actually, to see the Moon encroach upon a star, getting ever closer, and then, blip! The star vanishes behind the Moon's limb. I've watched this dozens of times and it never gets old. Sometimes, though, the Moon does itself one better. Or seven, actually: it passes in front of the Pleiades, a cluster of hundreds of stars in the constellation of Taurus. The Pleiades are a very tight formation, and only six or seven of the brightest members can be seen to the eye -- they form a shape that looks a lot like the Little Dipper, and are confused for that constellation by a lot of people. On Thursday, November 13, this will happen again. It starts around 16:00 ...