100 Years of Occultations: A Statistical View
D.J. Mink (SAO)
Over the past 20 years, stellar occultations have been use to probe planetary atmospheres and study the structures of planetary ring systems. This has been made easier by the location of many of the outer planets in star-dense regions near the galactic plane. By looking at the distribution of occultations over the 100 years from 1950 to 2050, we can see how lucky recent astronomers have been and what is in store for the future as well what great occultations were missed in the past.