Online Messier Marathon, 11st edition – 30 Mar. 2025.

After several years, after relocating our facility under a wonderful dark sky, we are proud to run again the Online Messier Marathon. We invented it in 2009, for the International Year of Astronomy, now we are read to run the 11st edition: join us from the comfort of your home.

Online Messier Marathon, 11st edition.

In 2009, while the world was celebrating the International Year of Astronomy (IYA2009), the Virtual Telescope Project (at that time less than 3 years old) launched a stunning idea: to run the legendary Messier marathon online, exploiting the benefits of its advanced telescopes and sharing the adventure with the world, online! It was a world premiere, it made history and we repeated it for several years.

Now, after a few years long hiatus, we decided to run it again, with an important innovation: it will be the first one run under the wonderful skies of Manciano, Tuscany, where our telescopes are now, blessed by the darkest skies of the Italian peninsula.

The Messier marathon consists in observing all the 110 objects in the Messier Catalogue in just one night, from sunset to sunrise. That catalogue contains the most beautiful galaxies, nebulae, star clusters in our sky, making the experience unforgettable.

This Messier Marathon, 11st edition, will start on 30 Mar. 2025, at 18:00 UTC.

To join the 30 Mar. 2025 Online Messier Marathon event, you just need to enter, at the date and time above, our webTV page here!

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