It’s always nice to start your morning with a smile — and this week the moon and a couple of planets are teaming up to make it happen.
Early risers will be able to catch a celestial “smiley face” in the eastern predawn sky Friday morning, as Venus and Saturn align themselves with a skinny crescent moon to form a slightly off-kilter cosmic emoji in the hours before sunrise.
The triple conjunction will be visible near the horizon starting just before sunrise, across Canada. Venus will be the first to appear in the sky, followed closely by Saturn and the moon.
Experts at The Weather Network say the best chance to spot this formation will only be open for about 15 minutes, or so, “before the Sun’s light begins to peek past the horizon.”
Of course, clear skies will be essential to view the full “space emoji,” and observers can pick up a pair of binoculars or line up a backyard telescope to get a better glimpse, before the morning twilight casts too much light.
This is what skywatchers in Calgary can expect to see.
Screengrab / Stellarium
While this is what skywatchers in Toronto can expect to get a glimpse of.
Screengrab / Stellarium
The folks at cosmo-focused website EarthSky warn that seeing a smiley face might take “some imagination,” depending on the viewer’s location. Memes circulating this week — depicting a symmetrical smiley face — aren’t what should be expected to appear in the sky on Friday morning.
Early risers in Vancouver can expect to see a similar formation.
Screengrab / Stellarium
In some countries, the mouth will be far too close or too far away from the eyes, they said. “And U.S. and Canadian viewers will see the face lying on its side, close to the horizon,” they wrote, warning that, “the two planets making up the eyes will have vastly different brightnesses, with Venus totally outshining Saturn.”
NASA has also been keeping an eye on the anticipated smiley face formation, sharing that stargazers “might also pick out Mercury looking bright, but very low in the sky.”
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