Shortest time to view all solar system planets?

[okiscopey]

Clear and cold around Kandos tonight, so time for a minor challenge: to view all of the seven other planets by eye or binoculars in one evening.
It wasn't too difficult. Mercury was near maximum elongation and easily visible by 6pm, with Venus, Saturn and Mars huddled together just above.

Neptune, Uranus and Jupiter were all picked up in the NE and E before 11pm (Jupiter had only just cleared local trees by then).

It was thus possible to view the lot within a four or five-hour span. Thanks to the IAU, I didn't have to find Pluto!

This minor exercise got me thinking. This is presumably not the shortest time period in which this can be done, but there can't be too many opportunities ... Mercury's so elusive and Uranus and Neptune have such long-period orbits.

Couldn't find anything on the web about this, and I'm not keen to run SN Pro forwards or backwards for many years to divine future or past 'bag-em-all' dates.


Anyone else done something like this, or care to comment?

[mental4astro]

Mate, great one! :thumbsup:

funny that this didn't occur to me! So obvious, :rolleyes:.

It wouldn't happen too often I would think to be able to view them all in one night, and only a few hours between being able to see them.

I'm impresse!

[StephenM]

That's excellent! :thumbsup:

I saw all of them except Uranus and Neptune, but now that you point this out, I'll make an effort and try to catch them all this evening!

Cheers,
Stephen

[okiscopey]

Just had a thought ... during a total solar eclipse, isn't it theoretically possible to see all of the planets (Mercury to Neptune) in the sky at the same time?

I'll leave it to the calculating gurus to work out which historical or future eclipses fit the bill!

[StephenM]

Hi Mike,

I've just taken up the challenge, and captured all the planets with my dSLR in under 4 hrs :). I've posted the results in the Solar System forum.

Cheers,
Stephen

[okiscopey]

Good work Stephen!

In the middle of the ocean and with perfect seeing (?!?) someone could get it down to 2 hours!

[renormalised]

Head up to Oak Beach settlement, near Port Douglas, on Nov 14 2012 and you'll be able to try it out!!!:)

[okiscopey]

That eclipse ain't so good ... only 3 planets visible then.

Here's the situation for the next 5 total solar eclipses visible from Australia as gleaned from Stellarium:

2012 November 14: only 3 planets above the horizon (Mercury, Venus, Saturn).

2028 July 22 (North WA): 6 planets visible (Neptune below horizon). Mercury only about 4 deg. from eclipsed Sun.

2030 November 25 (Streaky Bay SA): 3 planets visible (Mercury, Venus, Jupiter).

2037 July 13 (Sth. Qld): 5 planets visible (Mars, Neptune below horizon). Uranus only 1 deg. from Sun.

2038 December 26 (Eden, NSW): 4 planets visible (Mercury, Venus, Mars, Saturn).

[Gargoyle_Steve]

I've done the "all planet search" thing a few times, this thread from back in 2006 details my first attempt at bagging a bunch of them in one night:

http://www.iceinspace.com.au/forum/showthread.php?t=11396


and if scroll down this page ...
http://www.iceinspace.com.au/forum/showthread.php?t=24394&page=4
you'll find 2 of my posts with some info regarding one of my successful sessions in viewing all 9 planets - yes 9, in my opinion the challenge in viewing Pluto is about equal to almost the rest of the planets combined, and without Pluto included it's a much softer task.

(I don't use a GOTO scope either, but on some occasions have used my Argo Navis on the dob to home in on Pluto's location. You still have to work out however WHICH of those tiny mag 13 specks is Pluto, and which are just very faint stars.)

Planet hunting is fun, next you should try asteroid hunting, I think I viewed 6 in succession one night. It's a fun and different kind of viewing to the norm.

Cheers!

Steve

[okiscopey]

Steve, your October 2007 viewing of all the (then) nine planets (including Earth by astroron's sensible direction!) must have been a buzz, and very well done. Yes, perhaps asteroids are the next targets!

I note that it took at least a 9-hour span for you to achieve the planetary viewings, but it's obviously possible to do it in less time, as in my recent 5-hour slot. (Pluto was in fact well-placed if I'd had the gear and observing experience to be able to pick it up.)

However, as you say, locating Pluto is a completely different level of difficulty, and I'd restricted my relatively easy challenge to just eyes and binoculars.

StephenM did this in a similar time (but used a dSLR to 'retrospectively' identify Neptune on the computer screen … hmm, not sure that counts!:P).

So, has anyone else viewed all eight planets Mercury to Neptune (including Earth!) directly by eye/binoculars in a shorter time period?

Alternatively, does your planetarium program suggest any amazing viewing opportunities … past, present or future?

[mithrandir]

If you want to count dwarf planets, Pluto, Ceres, Eris and Sedna are all up at various times of the night. At the moment Makemake is up during the day.

[okiscopey]

Now that would be a real challenge - Sedna is 21st mag., the others not much brighter!