This month , if you should dispose your head somewhat upward at night , you will receive a treat in the build ofsix of the eight planetsvisible in the horizon .
Mercury , the airless major planet to the Sun ( andall the other planets ) , will not make the show in its current position behind the Sun , while you wo n’t see the eighth planet because you ’re standing on it . If you would like to see seven planet in the sky , you could plainly await until mid - February , when Mercury will pop its hot head out from behind the Sun .
But will all eight planets ( sorry Pluto ) ever align all together in the sky ? Well , that depends on your view .
First off , it ’s actually pretty rare for planets to coordinate perfectly , with their orbital angle of dip making a full alignment virtually impossible . If you were wait for the planets to ordinate so that they are within 1 academic degree of each other ( and assuming the Sun and the planet cheated their demise ) you would have to expect around13.4 trillion yearsfor such an event , and unless you’reBryan Johnsonyou in all likelihood are n’t plan on living that long .
" The planet ' orbits do n’t all exist dead in the same plane . They ’re all angle a slight , so that planet do n’t all flow precisely along a pedigree in the sky,“Philip C. Plait explainsin the bookBad Astronomy . " Sometimes a planet is a trivial above the plane , and sometimes a small below … For this reason , astonishingly , it ’s in reality rather rare for more than two planet to be near each other in the sky at the same time . "
When people refer to alignment , they are generally referring to the planet being in the same region of the sky , rather than perfectly lined up from our view , also bang as a " planetary parade " .
It ’s pretty uncommon to see all the planets on the same side of the Sun , too , with that taking situation or so once every thousand days , with the last natural event take seat in949 CE . The cheeseparing we will get to all the planets being aligned , at least within an imaginable timeframe , will be onMay 6 , 2492 . On this date , at around 5:00 am Eastern Standard Time , you would be able to see seven planets in a planetary parade , making an electric discharge just above the view . Looking down , of course , you would see the eighth beneath you .
Though you will not get to find this ( with apologies to Bryan Johnson ) , you’re able to see the position the planets will come along in the sky using gratuitous softwareStellarium , setting the date and clock time , and your position to just off the seashore of New York . But look up at the skyearly this year , and you will also get the essence of it .
