Venus
,
Mars
,
Jupiter
and
Saturn
are ready: for weeks it has been possible to observe them aligned at dawn, in a perfect diagonal.
The best part, however, is about to arrive because
Mercury
will soon become visible , in an alignment that exactly reproduces the natural order of the planets with respect to the Sun and which has not been seen for 18 years.
June 16th and 25th will be the best occasions to observe them.
The alignment of Venus, Jupiter, Mars and Saturn has been visible for weeks, but only in June do the planets appear in the order of their distance from the Sun and Mercury is added to the four, observes astronomer Sandro Bardelli, of the National Institute of Astrophysics (Inaf).
This kind of alignment happens every 20 years or so, he adds.
There have been several spectacular alignments in recent years: "in February 2016 and November of that same year the planets were aligned and visible at dawn, but not in the order of their distance from the Sun, says astrophysicist Gianluca Masi. , head of the Virtual Telescope Project. "Only going back to 2004, is it possible to find the same sequence, which reproduces the increasing distance from the Sun".
It is a show for which amateur astronomers from all over the world are preparing and also in Italy for some time the diagonal traced in the sky by Venus, Mars, Jupiter and Saturn has been observed.
"Now we add Mercury, still very low on the horizon", says Paolo Volpini, of the Italian Amateur Astronomers Union (Uai).
The UAI indicates that a first date to better observe the diagnostics of the five planets will be June 16, when Mercury will be visible in the early morning, before the sun rises. The planet will be at the maximum angular distance from the Sun, that is, at the maximum amplitude. of the angle between the Sun and the planet, as seen from the Earth.
Observation conditions are also excellent on June 25, when Mercury will rise one hour and 13 minutes before the Sun. "
To make the show even more interesting, Volpini continues, the Moon will take care of it: since the planets are anticipating the time they rise, it is also possible to observe their conjunctions with the Moon.
The first will be the one with Saturn, in the second part of the night between 17 and 18 June, but it is from 20 June that the dance of the Moon with the planets will come alive: on 20 and 21 June the Moon will be close and Jupiter and also to Mars, at the dawn of June 21st Venus will be added and, very low on the horizon, there will also be Mercury;
Moon, Jupiter and Mars will still be close in the last hours of the night of June 22;
will close the show, on June 26, the conjunction of the Moon with Venus and the Pleiades.
