A beautiful conjunction will occur tomorrow morning March 18th at 6:00 AM in the Southeastern skies of Utah. The crescent moon will be within a few degrees of the planets Jupiter and Mars. Not to be left out is Saturn situated just 6 degrees to the east. It is not often that you see these four celestial objects so closely associated together in the sky. It is definitely worth taking a look. Jupiter, Mars, and the moon should be visible together in a pair of binoculars.
Over the next few mornings Jupiter, Mars, Saturn, and the Moon will remain closely associated together in the morning sky.
The planet Mars has been absent from the sky for some time because it has been on the far side of its orbit appearing not far from the Sun in the sky. It is now moving away from the sun into the morning sky and will begin to brighten and will continue to do so throughout the spring and summer months. In October it will appear at its brightest and be a conspicuous reddish planet in the early evening sky.
Jupiter moves more quickly in its orbit than Saturn and is slowly moving toward Saturn. They will have a very close conjunction in December called the great conjunction because it involves the two largest planets. This conjunction occurs only every 20 years.
Our website is CVAS-utahskies.org.
