Another planetary alignment? Well, sort of...

There's lot of talk in the media and online about yet another planetary alignment that's happening on the 28th of February (or the 1st of March Australian/NZ time) and won't happen again for another 400 years. 

Why shouldn't we be getting excited over this date?

First of all, the planets move around the Solar System at a fairly leisurely pace. The Earth as you'd know takes about a year to complete an orbit around the Sun and even the innermost planet Mercury takes around 88 days. Beyond Earth, Mars and the other outer planets takes even longer. The outermost planet Neptune take some 165 Earth years to complete a Solar orbit. 

What this means is the any planetary events such as alignments or oppositions (when a planet is at its closest to Earth for a while) are great viewing the weeks leading up the event and after as well. They are not one of those "blink and you'll miss it" sort of astronomical events.

The seven planets that are part of this 28th February/1st March "planetary line up" - Saturn, Mercury, Venus, Neptune, Uranus, Jupiter and Mars will indeed be visible in the sky so yes, that bit of the reports are correct. They'll also be lined up for many days before and many days after that date.

Saturn and Mercury appear close to the Sun in the sky and will dip below the horizon while still in the glare of the sunset. This makes them very hard to spot.  Neptune which cannot be seen without a telescope will set with them.

Venus will set a little while after sunset and will appear in the early evening sky as a blazing white star. Jupiter and Mars are visible even to you eyes alone for well into the night. Both are spectacular with a telescope!

Uranus will also be in the sky after sunset but you will need a telescope to see it. You won't be able to see it with your eyes alone. 

Where the Solar System planets will appear on the 1st March around 7.15pm Sydney time. Please note the Sun will be in the sky at this time.

There will be seven planets in the sky early in the evening, some of which will be tricky to spot. They are also spread out over a large section of the sky and not in a neat straight line that the term "alignment" suggests. 

Ok, so what's the good part?

First of all, any news about celestial events is good news -  people looking up at the night sky will hopefully lead to a lifetime of discovery and wonder.  

This "event" might be overblown by some outlets in terms of the number of planets visible, how rare it is and the date it's happening.

On the plus side, there's still some of the most spectacular Solar System planets on show and this coming weekend the Moon is also setting early in the evening - meaning the night sky is not affected by moonlight and ideal for planetary viewing. 

It's well worth heading outside and looking up, especially with a telescope.  If you don't have one, this Celestron StarSense Explorer LT70 AZ not only is a great way to kick off your astronomy journey, it even uses your mobile phone to show you the around the Universe. 

You can find out more about this telescope here.

Another larger telescope that will provide even better views of the planets and ideal for starting deep-sky observing is the saxon  6" Dobsonian.

Dobsonian telescopes renowned for providing excellent value for money and this saxon "Dob" is a classic example of this. Read more about it here.

We're big fans of using binoculars for astronomy here at BINTEL but planets are quite small in sky and you won't really see much more detail if you look at them through binos.

While you're out there.

Observing planets through a telescope is often what leads many folks into astronomy.  There's nothing quite like looking at a bright "star" which turns out to be Saturn with its rings or Jupiter with moons when you view it through a telescope. While the planets are spectacular, there's only a handful of them and there's a lifetime of deep-sky astro objects to explore within our Milky Way galaxy and even beyond. 

Here's some guides to get you started:

• You've seen the planets, what now? A guide to the night sky in the coming months
• A guide to the night sky in the coming months part 2 - Globular Clusters
• A guide to the night sky in the coming months part 3 - Open Clusters and star colours

These only touch the surface and there's more guide on topics like double stars and galaxies that will be our website shortly.

If you'd like more information about some cool things are the sky every week, make sure you sign up for the BINTEL newsletter via our webpage. 

We feature current sky and nature events, product updates and news as well the latest in astronomy and space missions.

Cheers,

Earl White 

BINTEL

26th February 2025