Oolite Bulletins

A little reminder for those who may be up before dawn tonight/tomorrow. Venus and Jupiter will be very close together low in the eastern sky, with Mars and Saturn also nearby. Clear skies, everyone!

Five planets to line up in rare planetary conjunction

UK: Five major planets in our solar system will shine brightly in a row during a rare planetary conjunction from Friday.

If the sky is clear, the naked eye alone will be enough to see Mercury, Venus, Mars, Jupiter, and Saturn glowing before dawn.

It's a special opportunity to see Mercury, which is usually obscured from view by the Sun's bright light.

The conjunction is best seen on Friday but will remain visible until Monday from most parts of the world.

The last time this conjunction happened was 2004 and it won't be seen again until 2040.


The northern hemisphere, including the UK, will get the best views between 45 and 90 minutes before sunrise.

Aye - and the weather forecast chez Cody is cloudy all night. Bah!

Cody wrote: ↑Thu Jun 23, 2022 11:13 pm

Aye - and the weather forecast chez Cody is cloudy all night. Bah!

Lousy luck here too. Dense clouds and midnight sun.

Chances are better tomorrow morning, it seems.

I've come to believe that it's a fundamental truth of the universe that whenever there's some sort of newsworthy astronomical phenomenon, the weather wherever I am is guaranteed to be overcast. There can be beautiful sunshine in the days immediately before and after, but at the key moment, cloud.

Sounds like me in August 1999 - the first total eclipse visible from the UK since 1927, and it was clouded out.