A lingering artifact of the recent great gathering of the naked-eye planets is still evident in our evening sky. Even casual sky watchers may have taken note of the two very bright "stars" in the western sky for a couple of hours after sunset during the past week or so. City dwellers can't miss them, either.
Both objects shine with a silvery-white luster. One appears noticeably brighter. And in recent nights both drew noticeably closer to each other. These two objects are actually the two brightest planets, Jupiter and Venus.
The two planets will appear closest on June 3.
At this moment in time from our Earthly viewpoint, they are like two celestial ships passing in the night. Of course, the planets are nowhere near each other in space; they just happened to be aligned in such a manner so as to appear next to each other as seen from Earth. Venus is 120 million miles away, while Jupiter is 561 million miles from us. The actual (apparent) closest approach, with Venus sliding just 1.6 degrees above (north) of Jupiter, will take place at 18 hours Greenwich Time, which is during the daytime for North America. At that time, a distance of just over three times the apparent width of the full Moon will separate the two planets. Even though they will already be in the process of slowly separating as darkness falls across the Western Hemisphere, the two planets will still appear practically as close together as they were just hours before.
able --> Jupiter will shine about one-seventh as bright as Venus.
On subsequent nights, Jupiter will appear to drop rapidly away from Venus, setting progressively earlier and becoming more and more deeply immersed in the bright evening twilight. Jupiter will sit below and to the left of the crescent Moon on June 12, and will likely disappear from view by month's end.
Venus, on the other hand, reaches its highest altitude in the western evening twilight in June for this current apparition and captures the gaze of millions.
All through June, Venus will appear each evening more than 25 degrees high in the west right after sunset and will not drop below the horizon until at least 2 to 2 hours later. On the evening of June 13, look for the beautiful crescent Moon hanging above and to Venus' left.
By the end of June, Venus will be the only planet of the great evening array that will still be visible. All the others -- Mercury, Mars, Jupiter and Saturn -- will either be effectively masked by the glare of the Sun, or, as will be the case with Mercury, be accessible only in the early morning sky, just before sunrise.
Venus will continue to be visible in the evening sky, just after sunset, into the beginning of October.
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