‘Rare’ planetary parade on full display across the night sky

Stargazers will be able to see six planets in the sky simultaneously, with Mercury joining next month.

You won’t need to line the streets to see this parade, instead, you can look up at the sky and take a stroll through the stars.

The planetary parade is on full display until the end of February.

Danielle Pahud, an instructor in the department of physics and astronomy at the University of Manitoba and the director of the Lockhart Planetarium, said the parade is when every planet in our solar system is visible in the night sky.

“It’s fairly common for many of the planets to be visible at some point over the night, sometime between sunset and sunrise. But to have them all visible in the sky shortly after sunset is fairly rare. That occurs roughly on the 100-year time scale,” said Pahud.

Right now, she said Venus, Mars, Saturn, and Jupiter are all visible to the naked eye. Meanwhile, Neptune and Uranus require a telescope to be seen.

Mercury isn’t out just yet, but Pahud said by the end of February it will be out, and each planet will be visible.

“They’re all kind of scattered across a path or a road, but we can see them all at the same time.”

What makes this possible?

Pahud compared the parade to a racetrack, saying each planet has its own lane, and they each take a certain amount of time to rotate around the sun.

“Since all the planets are running around the track at different speeds, we expect them to kind of be scattered all the way around. So every once in a while, we’re going to have all the runners on the same stretch of track and on the other side of the sky from the sun. So that’s what we’re seeing now.”

The best time to see the parade is between 6:30 p.m. and 8 p.m., Pahud said, and the grand parade will be visible by the end of February.