Jupiter, the largest planet in the solar system, was at its closest to the Earth since 1963 on Monday, September 26. Although the planet is visible in the night sky as a bright speck of light, it will never be this close to the Earth again until 2129.

Social media is abuzz with pictures and wonderment at the sighting of this gas giant. In some of the pictures shared, one can spot two or three other specks of light around the planet, which are some of its largest moons. Jupiter has a total of 80 moons.

Check out some of the pictures right here:

Another Twitter user has captured a picture of the gas giant using a telescope:

The planet is already visible from New York, and can be expected to get brighter as the night rolls on:

 Tanja Bueltmann, a professor at the University of Strathclyde, has shared a picture of Jupiter she had taken from her kitchen. She captioned the post saying, “photo taken from my kitchen window (with telephoto lens and on a tripod). Tonight, Jupiter is at its closest to earth since 1963; it won’t be so close again until 2129. So this is a real once in a lifetime for all of us”.

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The event that is responsible for Jupiter being so clearly visible to the Earth is called opposition. This is a time when Jupiter is exactly opposite to the sun as seen from the earth. While the gas giant rises from the east as the sun sets in the west, it will come at its closest to the earth. This period is known as perigee. 

During the perigee, Jupiter will be 367 million miles from Earth. While this distance is not close by any stretch of the imagination, the longest distance between the two planets comes to around 600 million miles.