Posted on 07/06/2005 6:46:47 PM PDT by KevinDavis
What’s the deal with Mars?
Many people have received an e-mail in the last few months, which says this August Mars will be as close to Earth as it has been in 50,000 years. It says Mars will come to within nearly 35 million miles of Earth and — next to the moon — will be the brightest object in the night sky.
Well, no, and yes.
This August, Mars will make a close encounter with Earth, and although it will be spectacular, it is not a record breaker. The e-mail is two years old.
“Sometimes someone just hears something and passes it on,” Mars expert and Silverton High School graduate Gus Frederick said. “I’ve gotten (the e-mail) a couple times so far.
“It’s going to still be close,” Frederick added, “but not as close.”
So, why are we getting closer to Mars? Imagine Earth and Mars as two cars on a racetrack. If one is closer to the center of the track and traveling faster, it will eventually catch up to and pass the outer car. And because the distances between Earth’s track and Mars’ track from the sun differ at varying points in their orbits, the distance between Earth and Mars when they meet side by side every two years is different.
He may not be the only person in the area with his eye fixed on Mars next month, but Frederick is among the most knowledgeable in this region about the Red Planet.
Frederick, who has given detailed presentations to national audiences, and spent three weeks in a cave in Utah to simulate living on Mars, has had his eye on the red planet since he was a child.
“I was a ’60s kid and followed the Apollo missions,” Frederick said.
He remembers the first 20 photos to come back from the first Mars Orbiter sent to space, which all showed craters on the planet’s surface.
“That flavored people’s impressions of Mars for some time,” Frederick said.
As more orbiters photograph the planet and Rovers crawl across it’s face, more volcanoes and riverbeds are being discovered.
“The closer we look the more amazing it) looks and the more Earth-like it is,” Frederick said.
According to National Geographic’s July 2005 issue, images from orbit trace water on Mars today and in the distant past. Europe’s Mars Express orbiter took images of ice layers near the north pole, while NASA’s Mars Global Surveyor found a fan-shaped sediment formation 8 miles across, probably left by an ancient Martian river emptying into a lake.
“It’s not just finding small amounts of water; we are finding large amounts of water,” said Frederick, who has been researching and writing about Martian lava tube caves for more than a decade.
Lava tube caves – deep impressions created by volcanic lava flow that has crusted over – can be found across the United States in volcanic areas, including around Mount St. Helens.
The caves, which Frederick imagines astronauts could use as shelter when exploring Mars, have a tendency to house ice here in the United States. This leads Frederick to believe the same could be true on Mars.
Mars’ approach this summer isn’t just eye-candy for people enjoying the night’s sky.
NASA is planning to launch the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter on Aug. 10 from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida. Once it enters orbit, the reconnaissance orbit satellite starts a two-year mission to map Mars in great detail, helping Mars enthusiasts search for water and learn more about weather patterns on the planet.
While previous Mars missions have shown that water flowed across the surface in Mars’ history, it remains a mystery whether water ever existed long enough to provide a sustainable habitat for life.
According to NASA, the instruments, which cost more than $500 million, will return up to 40 times more data to Earth than any previous Mars mission.
“There are some pretty interesting things coming down the pipe,” said Frederick, who believes space exploration is “humanity’s role” in life.
“We need to do it because that’s what Earth does,” he said. “We are going to make other Earths, first on Mars and then who knows where else. We’re paving the way so the biosphere can expand.”
Art Bell ping!
Earth First! We'll mine the other planets later.
"The e-mail is two years old."
Ive been trying to convince people of that a lot lately. One e-mail even told me that mars would look "as big as the moon in the night sky."
I am intruiged that we zapped a comet 83 million miles away though...
Bring on the aliens...
I got that one too! Hey, it was worth a chuckle. Couldn't help but want to see all the croutons outside looking for Mars, as big as the moon!
I trhink if Mars was a big as the moon in the sky, we would all know about it. I think something like massive tides would be a tell.
I like Mars Bars. Milky Ways are good too.
No kidding, this is a couple of years past the 'use by' date.
THE SKY IS FALLING!
And it is Bush's fault!
You don't suppose somebody in Hollyweird is pushing this e-mail around? It would be great PR for the War of the worlds movie.
It's possible. The actors are getting a lot of publicity time, too. They have had that kid actor on the radio for a couple of days. Too cute.
Keep Watching The Skies
I believe it was one year ago that Mars was at its closest. In fact, I'm sure of it, so the e-mail is one year old.
Actually, it's really the earth's surface rising - because of global warming
And that's Bush's fault!
But there will be a very bright red "star" in the sky next election night. Maybe the heavens are turning republican.
Flat out wrong.
This year's closest approach is at the end of October/early November.
Okay, you beat me by 3 minutes 5 seconds....
;-)
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