Every planet in the solar system visible in a rare ‘planet parade’ on Wednesday

The planets of the solar system lined up in the sky Wednesday night in an astronomical phenomenon, visible from Earth, known as the “parade of planets.”

The phenomenon, which was also visible Tuesday night, gave sky watchers a good unaided view of Mercury, Venus, Mars, Jupiter and Saturn. With binoculars or a telescope, Uranus and Neptune could also be seen.

The parade of the planet is not an extremely rare event: it usually happens at least every two years. In fact, the alignment of eight planets occurred last time june.

To see the phenomenon, it was recommended to look south after sunset. From east to west, the planets appeared in this order: Mars, Uranus, Jupiter, Neptune, Saturn, Mercury, Venus.

“People should look south about 30 to 45 minutes after sunset to catch Mercury and Venus before they are too close to the horizon to observe,” said Vahé Peroomian, professor of astronomy and physics at the University of Southern California. “Jupiter, Saturn and Mars will be visible after dark, southeast to east.”

The planets can appear together in the same part of the sky during their orbits around the sun, Peroomian told CBS News.

“Mercury completes one orbit in 88 days, and Venus in 225 days. The outer planets move much more slowly: Jupiter takes 12 years to orbit the Sun, Saturn takes 29,” he said. “So as long as Jupiter and Saturn are visible, which is unless they are on opposite sides of the Sun from our point of view, the remaining planets will eventually line up.”

It is an even greater feat that Neptune and Uranus are also visible in the same time it takes 165 years and 84 years, respectively, to orbit the sun.

The two planets “spend a considerable amount of time on opposite sides of the Sun from our point of view,” Peroomian said.

On Wednesday night, Uranus and Neptune were relatively close, but because Uranus moves around the Sun twice as fast as Neptune, the planets will again be far from each other, he said.

As a result, “it won’t be possible to see both planets in the night sky at the same time for several decades,” Peroomian added.