If the sky is clear and the moon isn’t out, the night sky becomes a beautiful sight with thousands of tiny pinpricks that form constellations. Hidden in the sky, though, you may also find planets from our solar system that have wandered into view. Tonight, both Jupiter and Mars will be out, as well as Uranus if you can find it. So where can you find these nearby (relatively) planets, and how can you identify them?
At eight o’clock tonight, Jupiter will be situated between the horns of Taurus and a bit above where Orion’s bow is pointing. If you don’t know much about constellations, this planet will probably be the easiest for you to find. Look out for the signature three dots for Orion’s belt, the ‘V’ of stars that form Taurus’s face, and a cluster of seven stars nearby. If you see all three of these landmarks as well as a bright ‘star’ above the ‘V,’ then you’ve found Jupiter! Jupiter is probably the brightest ‘star’ you’ll see in the night sky, besides Venus, if you ever get a chance to see it. Despite being a bit over five times farther from the Sun than the Earth is, Jupiter is giant and has a diameter of about eleven times the size of Earth.
In a sense, Uranus should be pretty easy to find after you’ve spotted Jupiter. Right below Jupiter and Pleiades (the seven stars), Uranus can be found. This planet may be the third largest in our solar system, but it is so far away that it is hardly noticeable from our vantage point. So you may not be able to confirm that you managed to find it. Even so, it’d be cool if you did!
Mars is one of the closest planets to Earth but is really small. You will be able to distinguish it from regular stars by its orange-red glow that can’t be seen in the rest of the night sky. If you know your constellations, you’ll find them in the Gemini constellation in Pollux’s chest. If you have no idea what I’m talking about, look far ‘above’ Jupiter and Taurus for a pair of bright stars with a weirdly orange pinprick sitting below one of them. That orange pinprick is Mars. The reason Mars is so orange is because of all the iron scattered around its surface. There is some speculation that there could have once been life on Mars. In 2020, NASA sent a rover to Mars to collect samples from the planet’s dried-up riverbeds. Perseverance is expected to return to Earth sometime in the 2030s.
If you are willing to get up early, you may be able to also spot Venus. Right before sunrise, between 5:45-6:00, Venus can be spotted on the East horizon with the rising sun. It will appear as a bright dot right where the Sun is about to be. It will follow the Sun throughout the day but is most easily seen at dawn and dusk, depending on the time of its year compared to ours. This earns it the nickname of ‘morning star’ as well as ‘evening star.’
These planets will still be in the night sky for a while, so don’t worry too much about forgetting to look outside or there being a cloudy sky. Planets work at a much slower timeline than we do. If you want to look out for these planets, downloading a stargazing app can be really helpful. Some also tell you where passing satellites should be.
Good luck with planet hunting!
Resources:
Stellarium: an online map of the sky in real-time.
NASA: if you want to learn more about the Perseverance Rover and the samples it’s collected so far.
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