How to watch the parade of six planets in Vancouver?

With six planets visible in the January night sky, the University of British Columbia (UBC) Astronomy Club is hosting a special stargazing evening Friday in Vancouver. This event is free and open to the general public.

Immediately after sunset, Venus, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus and Neptune will arc from east to west. However, not all of these planets are visible to the naked eye.

This is why the Astronomy Club will make telescopes available to the public to facilitate the observation of the planets. The weather forecast also promises clear skies in Greater Vancouver.

You will have great views of Venus, Saturn, Mars and Jupiter. For Neptune and Uranus, with the telescopes we have, you could get a good idea of ​​them, but they are quite difficult to find, because they are in a part of the sky that contains very few bright starsexplain Jeremy Heylprofessor of physics and astronomy at theUBC.

It’s an event very special according to the professor, since these planets must all be on the same side of the Sun and Earththat is to say they all rise or set at the same time in the early evening sky so we can see them.

Moreover, this phenomenon is only visible for a certain period of time.

More or less every two weeks, some planets will set an hour earlier than they did two weeks ago. So in a few weeks, Saturn and Venus will be too low on the horizon at sunset for us to see them.

Conversely, around Valentine’s Day, Mercury will become visible for the pleasure of amateur and professional astronomers.

If you use a telescope or even binoculars, you will realize that it actually looks like the images we know. You can see the rings of the planets, details on their surfaces, their moons.

The evening, which takes place on the roof of the HEB Tower (the physics building of theUBC), starts from 6 p.m. There will be snacks for everyone and astronomy students will be on hand to answer questions from the public.

For those who cannot attend the evening organized by theUBCthe chance to observe the planets is not lost.

If you are in the city, go to a park, away from artificial street lights. You will be able to observe certain planets and constellations with the naked eyeadvises Jeremy Heyl.

For the teacher, it is important to take 10 or 15 minutes to observe the sky.

It gives us an idea of ​​our place in this universe. We are part of it. People have been looking at the sky for as long as there have been people. Now we spend so much time looking at our phones that we forget to look up.

Moreover, the next time such a parade of planets will occur will be in 2040.