In the last month, four planets – Saturn, Mars, Venus and Jupiter – are moving upwards from the eastern horizon.
But two are ready for a very close match. On Saturday and Sunday morning, Aphrodite and Jupiter will seem almost inseparable. It will separate them less than half the width of a full moon.
Such encounters – where two celestial bodies appear extremely close to the sky – are called links.
This is very nice! Jupiter, Venus and a crescent moon begin their movement in the sky yesterday morning. ShaughnessyB Photo with time lapse. pic.twitter.com/qvaziC0M5O
– @ KevinJanison
Of course, the couple is actually about 650 million kilometers away. Their orbits simply make them cross in the same part of the sky.
How and when to find them
If you want to get out of bed and have a look, the best time is before sunrise, around 5 to 5:30 p.m. local time. And you will need to have a good view of the eastern horizon.
This map of the sky shows where the planets will be in the east on the morning of April 30 at around 5 a.m. ET. Venus and Jupiter are at the bottom left. Mars is slightly red in the center of the frame, followed by Saturn on the right. (Stellarium)
You will find two extremely bright “stars” that are closer to the horizon. These are Zeus and Aphrodite.
The two will be less than a degree apart – 0.2 degrees, to be exact – on both April 30 and May 1.
Then, moving diagonally up to your right, you will find a faint reddish object: Mars.
And finally moving in the same direction, you will see Saturn.
If you want to see the connection better, you can use a pair of binoculars. Just make sure you leave them away before the sun rises. You do not want to risk hurting your eyes.
After this connection the couple will start to move further away in the sky.
The great thing about this connection is that it happens between two of the brightest planets in our sky. Venus is the brightest and is often referred to as either the “morning star” or the “evening star”, depending on where it is in the sky during the day. Sometimes it is confused with a plane or, yes, even a UFO.
Jupiter is the second brightest planet in the sky and it is hard to miss it.
These planets are so bright because they have what astronomers call high alveo (not to be confused with libido), a measure of the amount of light reflected from an object. Venus appears so bright for two reasons: one, because it has high alveolus due to its dense cloudiness, and two, because it is so close to Earth.
In the case of Jupiter, it looks so bright because it is just so big (it is the largest planet in our solar system) and has a high albedo due to its cloud cover as well.
In astronomy, size is a measure of the brightness of an object. the brighter it is, the smaller the number. At the meeting of the couple, Venus will be around -4.11 and Jupiter will be at -2.11.
If you want to judge how many different planets vary in brightness, you can compare Jupiter and Venus to Mars and Saturn, which are close by. By comparison, Mars will have a size of 0.93 and Saturn at 0.79. While they are still bright, they are not as bright as Aphrodite and Jupiter.
If your forecast requires clouds on Saturday or Sunday, you can still go out in the coming days to see the daily movement of the planets, as well as the coming days.
