Today's Google Doodle celebrates 'The Great Conjunction' of Jupiter and Saturn and 'Winter 2020'

In collaboration with NASA, today's animated Google Doodle celebrates "The Great Conjunction". In simple words, today marks the first day of winter in the Northern Hemisphere and the rare double planet sighting of Jupiter and Saturn. According to Google, these two are the biggest planets of all that can be viewed in the sky from "anywhere around the globe".  Today (21 December) also marks the longest night of the year.

Google says that the simultaneous sighting of the two planets has not been seen for almost 800 years. The company further explained that today, Jupiter and Saturn will cross within 0.1 degrees of each other. The two planets will remain almost 450 million miles apart. According to a previous report, the conjunction in 2020 won’t be matched again until the Jupiter-Saturn conjunction of 15 March 2080.

To see this rare sighting tonight, all you need to do is get a spot in a park or field. After an hour of sunset, grab your binoculars if you want, and you will be able to see a bright, easily visible star in the southwestern sky which will be Jupiter. According to Google, "Saturn will be slightly fainter and will appear slightly above and to the left of Jupiter until December 21, when Jupiter will overtake it and they will reverse positions in the sky."

from Firstpost Tech Latest News https://ift.tt/3nDrxaa