Cape Town – For the first time in over a decade, five planets will align, creating a morning sky spectacle for the next couple of weeks, scientists say.
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For about the next month, all five visible planets will appear before dawn – a sight last viewed in 2005. Interested parties can plan accordingly and watch the planets rise. “It will not jump out at you, but everybody should be able to see Venus and Jupiter”.
“Venus will be very bright on the eastern horizon, but it is Mercury that is always very hard to see as it is never very far from the sun and will be very close to the eastern horizon – I have never seen it”. If the dot blinks out quickly, it’s a star. The alignment of the five planets sticks around until February 20th. This will not happen again until 2018, so stargazers and space enthusiasts should definitely not miss this chance.
Each planet will appear in the sky one by one, starting Tuesday evening with Jupiter. Next came Mars at 1:11am, then Saturn at 4am, followed by Venus at 5am.
The best viewing time will be from one hour to an hour and a half before sunrise.
“It’s not super often you get to see them all at the same time in the sky; it’s like seeing all of your friends at once”, said Jackie Faherty, an astronomer from the American Museum of Natural History.
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This is also the reason why the planets will be visible in the morning sky, and not the usual night sky. “There they are, the other rocks or balls of gas that are running around the sun”.
