For Central Maine, the times for the occultation on Monday, January 13, 2025, are:
9:29:52pm — Occultation begins (Mars touches the Moon before vanishing behind it)
10:44:38pm — Mars reappears (the edge of Mars is first seen emerging)
For the hour-and-a-quarter in between these times, Mars will be behind the Moon.
In the days of Internet time servers synchronizing quartz clocks on our phones and computers, we tend to assume that those clocks are exactly correct. In reality, they can be off by a minute or so, a quirk of the economics of synchronizing so many phones and computers. Exact timings also may be earlier or later depending upon how far one’s viewing location is from wherever the timings shown were calculated. To avoid missing the occultation, be sure to start watching for both of its parts a few minutes early. If you are a CMASian snowbird spending the winter far from Maine, your timings will be significantly different!
