Jupiter: Location and Orbit

Facts in Brief

Aphelion	8.1662 x 10⁸ km
Perihelion	7.4052 x 10⁸ km
Minimum Distance from Earth	5.885 x 10⁸ km
Rotational Period (Day)	0.414 Days (9.93 Hours)
Orbital Period (Year)	11.86* Years (4,333 Days) * The approximation of 365.256 days per year is used.
Orbital Inclination	1.30530^o
Eccentricity	0.048393

Relative Location

Jupiter is the second superior planet with an orbit outside of the Earth's and the first one beyond the asteroid belt. Fifth planet from the Sun, the Giant Planet maintains a dignified minimum of 7.4 hundred million kilometers from the Sun. Because it has an average eccentricity of 5 percent, though, the planet never strays farther away than 8.2 hundred million kilometers. Despite its distance, its massive size makes it easily visible from Earth.

Orbit

Jupiter’s orbit is fairly regular, 0.05 from the circular. About 76 million kilometers separate its nearest and farthest points from the sun--its perihelion and aphelion. A Jupeterian day is nearly ten hours, a year on Jupiter is 4.3 thousand days. On Jupiter there are more than 43 thousand hours in a year, more than five times the number in a terrestrial year.

Seeing Jupiter from Space

Though an astronomical handbook is needed, once the general coordinates are known, Jupiter itself is not hard to make out. The fourth brightest object in the sky, after the Moon, Venus, and Mars (at some times), it is the only planet to be consistently bright even in the darkest nighttime sky—Venus, for example, is seldom visible in those conditions. The four Galilean moons may easily be seen with binoculars. A small telescope will make out a few bands and the Great Red Spot.

Copyright © 2000 by Gary Chan and Matthew McDermott. All rights reserved.