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Sky spectacle: Jupiter, Venus on a 'collision' course

Doyle Rice
USA TODAY
The planets Venus, right, and Jupiter share the evening sky behind St. Jerome's Catholic Church in Oconomowoc, Wis., Tuesday, June 23, 2015.

Skywatchers will get a special treat over the next few days.

For eight straight nights that began Saturday, the two brightest planets — Jupiter and Venus — are very close to each other in the evening sky, close enough to cover both with the thumb of your outstretched hand, according to Sky & Telescope.

The planets will be visible at twilight in the western sky, weather permitting.

Tuesday will be the best view, as the two planets will appear so close together that they'll look like a tight, brilliant double star in the evening sky, Sky & Telescope said.

Conjunctions are rare events in which two or more objects appear extremely close together in the night sky, NASA said.

While they may appear to be bumping into one another, they're actually far apart, CBS.com reported. Venus is 56 million miles from Earth, and Jupiter is 10 times farther out, at just over 550 million miles.

Also, the planet Venus is the second planet in the solar system, while Jupiter is the fifth planet from the sun.

YOUR TAKE:Share your photos of the night sky

The conjunction Tuesday is the best one we will have in the evening for quite some time, rivaled only by the one expected on March 1, 2023, which will not be quite as close, said Pat Hartigan, an astronomer at Rice University, in an interview with the Houston Chronicle.

The two planets will be so close together that you'll "be able to cover both with the tip of an outstretched pinky finger," according to Sky & Telescope.

Sky & Telescope also points out that this current string of Venus-Jupiter conjunctions closely resembles a similar series between the years 3 and 2 B.C. It has been suggested that their joint appearance might have been what came to be known as the Star of Bethlehem.

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