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Six planets align in the night sky, delighting stargazers as they grace our views of space for the rest of January and February.
Venus, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus and Neptune will appear side-by-side, forming a line across the sky, while Mercury will unfortunately be a no-show. The alignment of the rare planets can be realized in the next few weeks, with most of the planets of the solar system visible to the naked eye as a bright glow. NASA.
The six planets fit only from our perspective from Earth, a bit of a cosmic optical illusion, as each follows a widely varying elliptical path around the Sun. Their arrangement in the night sky depends on the orbit and position of each planet as seen from Earth.
While it is quite common for two or three planets to line up in the night sky, it is rare to see four or five planets at once. “These multi-planet viewing opportunities aren’t terribly rare, but they don’t happen every year, so it’s worth checking out,” NASA writes.
How to see the parade of planets
Since the beginning of January, the planets have started to approach each other. Venus and Saturn came within a finger’s breadth of each other in our view of the night sky this week in a binary planetary conjunction. In fact, the two planets are hundreds of millions of miles apart. Meanwhile, Mars is oppositional, meaning it is directly opposed to the Sun from Earth and will shine brightly all night during the month.
According to NASA, Venus and Saturn will be visible in the southwestern sky for the first few hours after dark, while Jupiter will shine high and Mars will be visible in the eastern sky. All four of these planets can be seen with the naked eye, but Uranus and Neptune require a telescope or high-powered binoculars.
The alignment of the planets will likely be visible about 30 to 60 minutes before sunrise. It is best viewed from a high, dark vantage point with little or no light pollution and a clear view of the sky.
The line formed by the planets in the night sky is called the ecliptic and represents the plane of the solar system where the planets orbit the Sun, according to NASA. This is a rare opportunity to marvel at the scale of our planet’s solar system and see the mighty planets shining in the sky.
If you can’t see the spectacle yourself, don’t worry – Europe’s Virtual Telescope Project 2.0 hosts a special live stream of the reunion. The broadcast begins at 12:30 PM ET (17:30 UTC) on January 25th.
