On Friday, February 28, a unique astronomical phenomenon will take place — a planet parade. On this day, Saturn, Mercury, Neptune, and Venus will line up at a short distance from each other on one side of the Sun. However, only the planets closest to Earth will be visible to the naked eye, according to Lyudmila Koshman, an astronomer at the Moscow Planetarium.
Four planets — Saturn, Mercury, Neptune, and Venus — will gather in a narrow sector of 20–30 degrees, and their location can be called a small planet parade, or rather, an invisible small planet parade, since only Venus will be visible out of the four planets, and it may be possible to "catch" Mercury in clear weather conditions.
According to her, the remaining planets of the Solar System will be on one side of the star, but at a greater distance — approximately in a sector of about 130 degrees.
The phenomenon should be observed from west to east. Saturn [will be visible] in the west, Mercury and Neptune can be seen next to it, and bright Venus slightly above. Uranus and Jupiter will be in the southern part of the sky, and Mars closer to the east.
The planets that will be in the west can only be seen in the evening, as they will disappear one after another behind the horizon following the Sun. The remaining planets will be available for observation throughout the night.
He clarified that in the evening of February 28, Saturn, Mercury, Venus, Jupiter, and Mars will be visible to the naked eye. To see Uranus and Neptune, you will need binoculars or an amateur telescope.
The term "planet parade" is not scientific and is only used to popularize astronomy. Several planets can be on the same line with the Earth and the Sun only once in millions of years. However, situations when celestial bodies are located close to this line with a slight deviation of 20–30 degrees and become visible from Earth almost simultaneously occur quite often. In such cases, we can talk about a "planet parade."
Large and small parades are distinguished. In the first case, five or more planets gather together, and in the second, four. If the planets are so close to the Sun that they cannot be seen from Earth, then such a parade is called invisible.
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