Stargazers and space enthusiasts were treated to a rare event on Friday, February 28, for the second time this year. A “rare planetary parade”, with seven planets aligning in a single line, was viewed in an ethereal celestial display.
People around the world were able to see as many as seven planets in the Earth’s solar system simultaneously, including Mars, Jupiter, Uranus, Venus, Neptune, Mercury and Saturn.
However, a telescope was needed to see them all at once.
The seven planets were visible in the evening sky soon after sunset, and the best time to view them all was 45 minutes after the sunset.
The rare spectacle is expected to be the last time all seven planets align in such a way until 2040.
Netizens share images of planetary parade
Netizens took to social media platform X to share images of the planetary parade as they witnessed it.
“The #PlanetaryParade Alignment from Cornwall_UK tonight :)… Mercury Saturn and Neptune all had set by this time,” a user said, sharing breathtaking images of the parade.
“Space is cool #PlanetaryParade #planetaryalignment,” another user said, sharing images.
What is a planetary parade?
All eight planets in the solar system orbit the Sun at different speeds but on roughly the same plane.
This is because the planets are thought to have been formed by a massive ring of gas and dust around 4.6 billion years ago — and they just kept on circling around that track.
“Every so often, when everything works out right, they all appear on the same side” of Earth, which makes them all visible in the sky at once, David Armstrong, an exoplanet researcher at the University of Warwick in the UK, was quoted as saying by news agency AFP.
This means that the planets look somewhat in a straight line from our viewpoint at the earth. However, they are not actually in a straight line in the solar system.
That can happen but is even more rare, Armstrong told AFP.
