Those fond of watching celestial events will be in for a treat Wednesday as they will witness a spectacle of the ‘fab five’ planets aligning in one direction. The planets, Mercury, Venus, Mars, Saturn and Jupiter, will be headlining across the dawn sky early in the day and the parade will repeat itself every morning until late next month.

And what more, stargazers can see these five planets simultaneously with the naked eye, said Jason Kendall, who is on the board of the Amateur Astronomers Association of New York. It is the first-of-its-kind show in more than a decade, which will last from January 20 to February 20.
The best period to watch all the planets, though, would be from the end of January until the first week of February when Mercury would be at its highest points.

Mr. Kendall said in the Northern Hemisphere, space enthusiasts would be able to watch the event 45 minutes before sunrise. “For Mercury you will need binoculars. It will not jump out at you, but everybody should be able to see Venus and Jupiter”, he said.

Jackie Faherty, an astronomer from the American Museum of Natural History, said skygazers hardly get to see the fab five together in the sky. “It’s like seeing all of your friends at once. There they are, the other rocks or balls of gas that are running around the sun”, said Mr. Faherty.

Now how to identify the five planets from the stars, which too dazzle equally in the morning sky? Mr. Kendall has a solution for this too: close one eye, stretch out your arm and slowly pass your thumb over a bright dot in the sky. If the dot slowly dims out when your thumb passes over it, it’s a planet. If it quickly blinks out, it’s a distant star.