The seven other planets aligned in the sky for what is called the Planet Parade.
Tennessee Tech Physics Department Chair Stephen Robinson said the actual alignment will be most noticeable when Mercury becomes visible Friday. Multiple planets including Venus, Jupiter, Mars, and Saturn are visible right now. Robinson said the celestial event gives people the chance to appreciate the massive scale of the solar system.
“The planets all kind of line up with each other in a disc shape, their orbits line up in a disc,” Robinson said. “And at a time like this when you can see this number of planets lined up in the sky you can actually see, if you use your imagination you can see that disc of the solar system laid out in front of you.”
Robinson said the brightest planets can be found by looking towards the western horizon, looking up, and then turning to the south. Robinson said Venus will be the brightest at around twenty-five degrees above the horizon, Jupiter will be the second brightest to the south of Venus, and Mars will be further along that line.
“Getting them to go out and imagine your standing on this planet looking out in the disc of the solar system and seeing it laid out there in front of you really helps to relate the classroom models of the solar system that we see typically in schools and in colleges versus the reality of it,” Robinson said.
Robinson said some of the brighter planets will actually become less visible as time goes on. Robinson said Uranus and Neptune are dimmer than the other planets and will require at least binoculars, if not a telescope to see clearly.
“By the time the 28 comes around and we can get a glimpse of Mercury, Saturn’s going to be so low to the horizon it’s going to be difficult to see,” Robinson said. “So I would advise people to go out and look when we have a clear night even right now and don’t wait until the 28.”
Robinson said planetary alignment itself can happen every couple years, but having all the planets in place at once is much rarer. Robinson said the planets all go around the sun in a disc-like rotation, but they all go at different speeds so they are often getting ahead or behind one another.
“We just happen to be at a time right now where the different speeds have taken them to this place where they’re kind of spread out from our point of view but still all visible from the Earth rather then some of them being round the other side of the Sun as they often are,” Robinson said.
