STARGAZERS WITNESSED a rare conjugation of the Venus and the Saturn on Sunday evening. The Saturn courted Venus, the planet of love, which appeared much brighter and bigger.

 

Although the planets appeared pretty close, the distance between the two was 9.4 AU. 1 AU (Astronomical Unit) is 149,597,870 kilometres.

 

The conjunction usually happens once every 13-14 months. But most of the time, the distance between them is either very large or the conjunction happens in the fierce glare of the sun.

 

This time the union was almost 45 degrees away from the sun and the event was clearly visible.

 

In July, the two planets will again pull from each other with Venus disappearing under fire of Sun and loosing her dazzling glitter and Saturn’s ring system getting blocked.

 

Every once in a while the planets do a loop of their orbits coming closer together. The next time this kind of celestial conjugation can be seen in 2009.

 

Sky chart showing Venus and Saturn

 

Venus is bright in part because it comes closer to Earth than any other planet.

 

Saturn is the most distant world that one can easily see with the unaided eye. These two bright pinpoints in our twilight sky are two very different kinds of worlds. Venus is a rocky planet like Earth, and Saturn is a gas giant.

 

At mid northern latitudes, Venus and Saturn stay out a bit longer than 2 hours after sundown.

 

Venus’ orbit lies inside the Earth’s orbit, at about seven-tenths the Earth’s distance from the sun.

 

Saturn resides in the solar system’s hinterlands, its oblong orbit is at 9 to 10 times the Earth’s distance from the sun.

 

The first four planets from the sun – Mercury, Venus, Earth and Mars – are all terrestrial or rocky planets. The outer four planets – Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus and Neptune – are all gas giants.