If you look up on a clear evening this summer, you can witness a relatively rare astronomical event: a parade of four planets clearly visible to the naked eye.

Stardome Observatory and Planetarium astronomer Josh Aoraki says you can see two planets in alignment and visible to the naked eye once or twice a month, but an alignment of four easily visible planets only happens every couple of years.

Josh says the planets travel around the sun at roughly the same angle on the ecliptic plane, and every now and then the planets will line up in an arc across the earth’s sky. The planets aren’t always visible. They can be obscured by the horizon or the sun and, when they are further away in their orbit, they may be too dim to spot. When several planets in alignment are visible it is called a planetary parade.

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