I hope no one thinks I'm in anyway promoting any "end of world" nonsense!
The title of the thread is meant all in jest. For certain there's a lot of people who blindly believe in any form of astrological themes. This forum is not to promote them at all. It's great reading the contributions being made as they are all in keeping with the light hearted nature of the title
What IS "new" is the appearance of all the major bodies of the solar system all at once. For this alone I see it as a great opportunity as a tool by which to engage with the wider community with a REAL celestial event, not one that does not focus on any actual celestial event.
There is the occasional linear alignment of the 8 planets plus Pluto, but this "alignment" still leaves the planets spread out at best within a 30° angle from the Sun. The next such alignment is expected in 2854 -
THEN the world will crap itself... (just kidding!!!! Sheesh...
) But this still only puts 6 planets visible at the one time as Mercury and Venus will be inside Earth's orbit and not visible with the others.
You can read some more on these planetary alignments on this site:
National Solar Observatory Sacramento Peak: Planetary Alignments
Seeing all 8 planets plus the Moon and Pluto all simultaneously is a very rare event. All the reading I've been able to find about any simultaneous planetary sightings has only had 6 planets at any one time, at most, including for this year, with the distribution of these planets is still a very wide one across the sky. Can't get any wider than what will occur in October though!
Thinking about it a bit more, this October's apparition may well be the first of a run of such complete planetary appearances. Right now Jupiter and Saturn are "chasing down" Pluto over the next couple of years, and will remain within close proximity to Pluto for a few more until all four gas giants leave Pluto behind. This means that there's a chance for a few more such complete simultaneous sightings of every major body in the Solar System to happen, and it will be a short lived event due to the fleeting appearances of Mercury and Venus. It will be a very long time before any such event happens again! Will need to spend a bit more time with Sky Safari to find out!
Alex.