Mars

[selfemployed]

Mark your calendars.
This is amazing that no one has seen this in recorded history, so that means if and when it happened before the people that saw it probably did not know what it was. The last time it happened was 3000 years before Jesus was born and the next time it happens your grandchildrens grandchildren will not be alive to see it.




Mars





The Red Planet is about to be spectacular!

This month and next, Earth is catching up with Mars in an encounter that will culminate in the closest approach between the two planets in recorded history. The next time Mars may come this close is in 2287. Due to the way Jupiter's gravity tugs on Mars and perturbs its orbit, astronomers can only be certain that Mars has not come this close to Earth in the Last 5,000 years, but it may be as long as 60,000 years before it happens again.

The encounter will culminate on August 27th when Mars comes to within 34,649,589 miles of Earth and will be (next to the moon) the brightest object in the night sky. It will attain a magnitude of -2.9 and will appear 25.11 arc seconds wide. At a modest 75-power magnification







Mars will look as large as the full moon to the naked eye.

Mars will be easy to spot. At the beginning of August it will rise in the east at 10p.m. and reach its azimuth at about 3 a.m. By the end of August when the two planets are closest, Mars will rise at nightfall and reach its highest point in the sky at 12:30a.m. That's pretty convenient to see something that no human being has seen in recorded history. So, mark your calendar at the beginning of August to see Mars grow progressively brighter and brighter throughout the month.

[caosesvida]

I think you meant to say, as bright as the moon not as big as the moon, If mars was that big, It would be so far out of orbit, it would be the end of all of us.

it still will be outshone by venus and the moon, even at 34.6 million miles away it is very, very, very far.


I watched it in 1988 when it was 36.5 million miles away with a 16" newtonian, at sea level, I could just barely make out the ice cap. Maybe this time I will acutally be able to see it, but takinging into account of the time and my eyes who knows. With the naked eye it will look like a bigger red dot in the sky.

[selfemployed]

I copied and pasted the e-mail I got. Not responsible for the content

[coolwhip]

Maybe we will see some aliens looking at us.

[spotts]

flippin him off.

[caosesvida]

Originally posted by selfemployed
I copied and pasted the e-mail I got. Not responsible for the content

sorry, didn't mean it as a personal critique.

[Green Mountain]

Originally posted by spotts
flippin him off.

You folks in Colorado are so far up in the mountains you won't need no stinking telescope.

[spotts]

throw a rock at it.

[maintenanceguy]

My wife likes this stuff.

Always looking at the planets when you can see them. She knows venus, mars, probably others.

They look like dots to me. The sky's filled with dots just like them.

[selfemployed]

Originally posted by caosesvida

Originally posted by selfemployed
I copied and pasted the e-mail I got. Not responsible for the content

sorry, didn't mean it as a personal critique.

Wasn't taken that way I just didn't want to be responsible for anything today.

[selfemployed]

Can't wait to get an eye full with my 4" mirror. A full moon makes your eye hot.

[Diceman]

Good, it's real close, maybe we can still get Bush to go there now.............

[otto]

It's a hoax. This has been floating around the net lately and there will be no event like this. It happened 2 or 3 years ago.

http://www.space.com/scienceastronom...mars_hoax.html

[Edited by otto on 08-19-2005 at 07:34 AM]