The most striking planet event of October is the beautiful gathering of Venus, Mars and Jupiter in the eastern sky in the two hours before dawn. October begins with Venus, Mars and Jupiter strung out like beads in the eastern sky. On Thursday, Venus rises in the east at 3:30 a.m., and is hard to miss if you are up at that time; it shines at a brilliant minus 4.5 magnitude. A half-hour later, at 4 a.m., amber Mars rises below Venus, shining faintly at 1.78 magnitude. Mars came around the back side of the sun recently and is very far away, and thus dimmer than many of the sky’s bright stars. Finally, Jupiter rises at 4:30 a.m., a half hour after Mars. Jupiter is brilliant at minus 1.7 magnitude.

Since day does not break till around 5:30 a.m. in early October, you’ll have a full hour to catch this trio in the east before daybreak. By 5:30 a.m. in early October Venus is almost one-third of the way up in the east. As you work your way down to the horizon, you’ll come across the star Regulus in Leo, bluish-white, just before you get to Mars. Regulus is one of the dimmer first-magnitude stars, but still outshines Mars right now. Then catch Jupiter near the eastern horizon.

As October goes on, these morning planets gather with each other, and with the moon. The view will be spectacular in the early hours of Oct. 8, with the crescent moon just above Venus. On this day, Mars is well below Venus, and Jupiter is below Mars. Jupiter and Mars will catch up by Oct. 18; early on the 18th, faint Mars and blazing Jupiter will be side by side in the eastern sky, with Mars less than half a degree (that’s the width of the full moon) to the left of Jupiter as Venus shines above them both. By the 18th you’ll have from 4 a.m. to dawn to catch the view. Adding to the attraction: By mid-month the planet Mercury rises around 5:15 a.m., making it possible to see Mercury, Mars, Jupiter and Venus all at the same time in the just-before-dawn sky.

The dance continues. Early on the morning of Oct. 25, Jupiter will have risen next to Venus in the eastern sky, and the sky’s two brightest dots will stand side by side that morning; Jupiter will be only about one degree to the left of Venus. Meanwhile, Mars will hang like a little orange pendulum below the two much-brighter planets. Down below, Mercury just rises about the east horizon at 5:30 a.m. before day breaks.

Finally, early on the morning of Oct. 31, Venus and Mars will have their chance to stand side by side, Mars to the left of the infinitely brighter Venus, with Jupiter now shining above the two other planets. Mercury, in its final days of a morning appearance, barely makes it over the horizon on Halloween morning before day breaks and washes it out.

It’s great that the morning planets are so spectacular, because we’re entering a planet drought in the fall evening sky. Look for Saturn about one-third of the way up in the southeast at dusk in early October, setting around 9:15 p.m. The planet shines nicely at 0.05 magnitude, and has a white color, tinged ever so slightly with yellow. Saturn remains in front of Scorpius the Scorpion, as the planet nears the southwest horizon.

By Oct. 15 Saturn is only 15 degrees above the western horizon at dusk, not much more than the width of your hand at arm’s length, and sets by 8:30 p.m. On that night, look for a crescent moon to the right of Saturn.

By Halloween, Saturn will barely emerge at dusk before it sets and as we enter November, we lose the ringed planet entirely.

Other sky events

The term “supermoon” is a very recent invention and refers to a full moon that occurs when the moon is closer to the Earth than usual during the moon’s slightly oval path around our planet. (On any given month, the moon is officially “full” at that moment when the sun, earth and moon are in a straight line, with the Earth in the middle.)

Since the moon’s path is oval, or elliptical, the moon can be as close as 221,000 miles from us or as far as 252,000 miles. When the moon is at the closest point to Earth in its monthly path around the earth it is said to be at “perigee.” A supermoon is a simply a full moon that occurs on the same day that the moon is at perigee.

The moon is full at 4:50 p.m. today and the moon’s closest approach to Earth occurs a mere 50 minutes earlier, at 4 p.m. The moon will be a mere 221,754 miles away at perigee this month. This does make it the “superest” moon of the year!

Since the Sept. 27-28 full moon and another on Oct. 27-28 occur when the moon is a little closer to Earth than usual, the moon appears a little larger than a “normal” full moon on both evenings. However, since the moon on each of those evenings will be no more than 7 percent bigger than an average full moon, you probably wouldn’t notice the difference unless you’ve heard about the supermoon.

The Sept. 27-28 moon will be eclipsed, and half of the planet will see it, including all of North, Central and South America, weather permitting.

However, while the Hawaiian Islands had a great view of the last three total lunar eclipses, our luck runs out on this one. The eclipse ends about 6:30 p.m. Hawaii time, just as the moon rises here.

The eastern half of the continental United States will see the lunar eclipse in its entirety, as will all of Canada from Ontario eastward. The western half of the U.S. and Canada will see the moon rise in eclipse but will still have a good view of the total phase.