Three Planets Racing this Weekend

William Robinson writes "This report asks you to keep your eyes on the skies this weekend, when a rare triple-planetary alignment is going to happen. It promises a stellar show for star-gazers. Scott Young of the Manitoba Museum Planetarium says the planets in question -- Mercury, Venus and Saturn -- are all big enough to be seen without a telescope."

Comments

That's no Moon! It's uh, um..

[Mulletproof]

" And while star-gazers will be able to obscure all three planets simply by holding their outstretched thumb to the sky, Young reminds them appearances can be deceiving.

"In reality, the planets are millions of kilometres apart," he said. "They only appear close in the sky because of our perspective. Saturn is actually over a billion kilometres behind Mercury."

Oh thank God. I thought they were all going to crash into one another, showering the earth with deadily meteors or something. THANK YOU for thet reminder, Mr. Young.

Planet spotting

[tolkienfan]

Mercury is actually quite hard to see because it's close to the sun - you can only catch it at certain times of the year and only ever close to dawn and dusk.

Venus is similar - but less so.

Saturn is often in the sky, and is a beautiful sight through a telescope.

I can't wait to see them all so close together - Let's hope for clear skies!

Planet Racing? ...

[GreatRedShark]

I want to know what odds the people in Vegas are giving to Mercury. I've got a lucky feeling about that planet!

Binoculars would be ideal

[NotQuiteReal]

If you are just starting, get some binoculars.

Binoculars and a star chart.

Re:Binoculars would be ideal

[res ipsa loquitur]

" If you are just starting, get some binoculars."

As someone who has used both binoculars & telescopes as an amateur, I would like to second this advice. Here are some specific reasons why:

Movement. Telescopes all seem to have at least one direction reversed (in other words, to move the field to the right you need to move the telescope to the left. Or up/down is reversed.) This is not something that you get used to after 5 minutes - it's an ongoing frustration. And it's important because of:

Field of vision. Telescopes tend to have a smaller field of vision, often something like 2 degrees (I'm going from memory here.) That may not sound bad, but in practice it can become a major hassle as you have to constantly move the telescope to keep things in your field of view. Also, you often want to view larger areas of the sky at one time without having to move your telescope. And given the movement problem (above), you will find yourself adjusting the telescope the wrong way about half of the time. Stupid? Yes. Frustrating? Double-yes.

Ease of use. Telescopes require setup time. Binoculars require removal of the lens caps. This is one of those things that doesn't seem like a big deal in the store, but in real life it will quickly become a major issue (unless you leave you telescope planted in one place all of the time, which I don't think is an ideal situation for an amateur.) You want to be able to scan the sky with your bare eyes & then _immediately_ use your magnifying device to look at something specific. You do _not_ want to mess around with tripods and sighting scopes just to see the latest thing that caught your fancy. Binoculars win big here. Don't underestimate the usefulness of binoculars' quick reaction time. In my view, this is the most important factor to consider; if it isn't easy to use, you won't use it.

For the record, I'm an amateur who has owned and used both inexpensive binoculars and an inexpensive telescope. I would _hands down_ recommend the binoculars. Get practical experience, and _then_ shop for a telescope.

One more thing. Binoculars are much more kid-friendly than telescopes, so if you're a parent trying to interest your children in astronomy, add that to the above reasons.

I hope this helps.

Correction

[QuickFox]

It promises a stellar show for star-gazers.

I'm afraid you've misunderstood this. It's not a stellar, it's planetary.

Big or small moon?

[LiquidCoooled]

When aligned, the planets will fit into a piece of sky the same size as a full moon.

Is that the low hanging moon or the smaller moon?

US Race Fans Widely Dissapointed

[Sv-Manowar]

After a six car US F1 GP, only three planets racing this weekend?

Re:Are there any simulations available for viewing

[Junta]

Not specifically for this event, but a really awesome simulator for astronomy stuff in general is celestia. http://www.shatters.net/celestia/

Click on the earth, hit g (actually celestia starts you at earth), you can hit o to mark orbits to make it easier to find the planets (hit p to show labels to identify the planets themselves.)
I hit shift-g to go to the surface of earth and then find the planets. Can give you a good idea where to look really. Being on the surface isn't particularly important at first, don't want the planet being between you and your destination until you are sure it wouldn't be.

It doesn't always much like things really do, especially with atmospheric simulation not being particularly complex in celestia, but it is cool none the less. Particularly to click on one of the three planets close together, hit g, then look at everything from their perspective.

Science for non-scientists

[jfengel]

Thing is, the conjunction isn't really all that interesting, scientifically. It's interesting mostly because it's rare, and it's a way to get the vigorously nonscientific to actually watch the planets move across the sky. Go out on two successive nights and you can watch them move relative to each other.

No biggie for your college-educated, Slashdot-reading brain, but a lot of people are bored stiff by science. Turn on Jeopardy some day and watch as the board clears of every category except Science. Not always, but too often.

There's an awful lot of people who don't really get how the planetary orbits work, and probably DO think that they would collide. I bet you know at least some of them. Take them out and show them the conjunction. Take them out on successive nights and describe how we can figure out the heliocentric universe from the observations.

Re:Science for non-scientists

[TrappedByMyself]

Take them out on successive nights and describe how we can figure out the heliocentric universe from the observations.

"After our first date I couldn't get a hold of her. I even left a message telling her how I would teach her how to figure out the heliocentric universe from our observations. Hmmm, she must have left town for an emergency, but lost my number and couldn't call. Let me sit by the phone and wait."

My money is on Mercury...

[gunner800]

It has the inside track.