Dawlish News

Venus made a rare transit across the face of the Sun on Tuesday, giving stargazers from Australia to the Middle East and Africa a celestial view that no living person had seen before. To the delight of hundreds of people around the globe armed for the occasion with telescopes, pinhole cameras and special glasses, Venus appeared at 0520 GMT as a small black dot on the lower edge of the Sun at the start of its six-hour transit. "This morning we are watching the first transit of Venus since 1882 -- until this morning no one alive has ever seen this event," said Dr Robert Massey of Britain's Royal Observatory in Greenwich as more than 100 people gathered in the courtyard of the London landmark to witness the phenomenon. Banks of photographers with telephoto lens and television crews captured the event. People queued patiently as parents lifted small children to gaze into telescopes set up in the courtyard of the observatory on a clear, warm morning. Others used special glasses handed out by staff to see the event. "It is very mysterious," said Japanese tourist Hiroyuki Narasawa, after peering up at the sky through a cardboard tube and camera. NO CLOUDS. On the other side of the globe in Australia it was already afternoon when 40 amateur astronomers gathered at the home of Jos Roberts north of Sydney. "I feel very privileged to be alive at the right time, to be in the right place, to have no clouds or monsoons," said Roberts who toasted the event with champagne with his colleagues. In the Middle East, schoolchildren gathered on the hills outside Beirut to watch the passage through dark glasses.