Utah Residents Eagerly Await Tonight’s ‘Planetary Parade’

"This is going to be freakin' awesome," said St. George's Jerry Hafen. "I love this kind of stuff."

Hafen is referring top a "Planetary Parade" set to take place tonight.

Basically, the "Planet Parade" refers to tonight's fairly rare occurrence of planets lining up so that we can see them all at the same time.

Stargazers will be able to see seven planets form a line in the sky just after dusk.

The hardest planets to see with the naked eye will be Saturn and Neptune, and NASA officials suggest a pair of high-powered binoculars or a telescope to get a full view.

Mercury has a much faster and different "ellipse" around the sun, which means it doesn't necessarily coincide with the planetary parade very often, but tonight will be special with even the fiery planet join9ng in the parade.

Scientists urge stargazers to find an area that has very little light pollution and where the viewer has a fairly clear and unobstructed view of the western sky.

Again, two of the planets (Saturn and Neptune) will be difficult to see without the use of some magnifying device like high-powered binoculars or a telescope, but even with the help, at least five planets should be visible to the naked eye if the conditions are right.

Weather forecasters say there should be very few clouds tonight so the viewing conditions should be ideal.

Our partners at ABC4 did add that a storm is approaching and we could have moisture and cooler temperatures by early next week, but the weekend should be beautiful in Utah's Dixie.

It's also worth noting that of the vast amount of certified International Dark Sky Parks and Communities in the world, the highest concentration of them are in the state of Utah.

Ideal viewing of the Planet Parade is from a Dark Sky certified location (like Ivins, or Zion National Park).

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