Show Before the Snow

With knowledge of the forecast for a significant winter weather event the following day I was pleasantly surprised to find the skies over eastern Iowa clear on the evening of April 17, 2018. This was especially pleasing for the fact that a crescent moon and brilliant planet Venus would be in conjunction with one another just after sunset this evening. The image above, shot at 8:45 pm CDT,  looks west from Oliver Court in Marion, just south of Boyson Road and just west of Alburnett Road. It is a one second exposure at f/5, 400 ISO and 70mm focal length. Venus shone at magnitude -3.92 in chilly weather conditions which registered 38 degrees F with ENE winds at 10 mph or better.

I added Venus (right) to this zoomed-in image of the moon, and it appears much closer to its conjunction partner than it actually was. Both images were shot using the same settings: one second exposure at f/5.6, 400 ISO and 300mm focal length. Time was 8:47 pm. Note the Earthshine on the moon. Left and above the moon is the dim 4.12 magnitude star 5 Tauri. Nikon D7200 DSLR camera.

Snow, snow go away, come again some other...month!: The much anticipated winter weather system arrived here about 12 hours after the top images were viewed. The system came with rain, freezing rain, sleet and snow. Above, the wintry mass was well under way when part of it was captured at Bowman Woods Park looking south in Cedar Rapids at 3:18 pm CDT, Wednesday, April 18.

Radar screen capture of the system as it appeared around the time of the above image on Wednesday. The Cedar Rapids metro area received about one inch of snow when it ended early the next morning.