Mars Rising; August 27th, 2003

[TheShinje]

[size=1] As many of you would have heard by now, Mars, the red planet, will be visible in our night sky this month, and on August 27th 2003, it will be closer to us that it has been for over 50 000 years.

The reason being is that "Earth orbits one step inward from Mars in orbit around the sun, and we move faster than Mars in orbit. Every two years, we pass between the sun and Mars. We'll do that next on August 28. But every 15 years we pass between Mars and the sun at a time when Mars is closest to the sun in its orbit. This year, we're doing something more. We're going between Mars and the sun. Mars is closest to the sun. And Earth was farthest from the sun in its orbit on July 4. So, the day before Earth passes between Mars and the sun, on August 27, we'll be closer to Mars than we've been for tens of thousands of years." - earthsky.com

I am very excitied :D I enjoy astronomical events like this, and the Grand Alignment 2000, which was purported to cause us cosmic doom. I also hope to see a star supernova in my lifetime too. Space has always transfixed me with it's beuty and awe, So I always get hyped for an event such as this.

What do you think of Mars rising in our night sky this month? Will you be star gazing? Have you already seen it?

[img]http://www.earthsky.com/2003/Images/0814.jpg[/img]
It'd be cool to see it this size :D tjough, I higly doubt it wil get this close.

- Peace out. [/size]

[Patronus]

[size=1][color=333366][b]Wow, I'll be sure to check it out. If I'm not mistaken, there is some Wiccan/Pagan significance to it. I'll have to check, but I'm almost positive.

Leh[/b][/color][/size]

[Valen]

That it is, Logan... bwehehehe... At midnight, when the powers are-- ..........................erm...... don't mind me everyone lol... I have been keeping an eye on Mars since I first saw it by the Orion constellation in the beginning of July. When we get closer, it should look like a Red Giant being a little over 100 Light years from earth or so...

[Guest Forbidden One]

[color=blue]I'm looking forward to getting a glimpse of Mars, this would be my first time seeing it. I've never actually have had the chance to in all my life and this sounds like a perfect oppertunity for a glimpse. [/color]

[TheShinje]

[size=1] What exactly is it's pagan and wiccan significance? It has Bible prophecy significance too, I'd like to know what it's pagan significance is. [/size]

[Valen]

Oh? What's this biblicalness(is that a word?) of it?

[TheShinje]

[size=1] "there will be signs in the heavens at the end of the age"
Matthew 24

Also, it says that "the moon will turn a blood red" - Revelation.
. Perhaps, John the apostle, writing in the first century, saw a Mars in our atmosphere as a blood red moon.
This + Grand Alignment 2000 + catastrophict tides and weather = Signs in the heavens.

Biblicalness is not a word I don't think ;)[/size]

[RPCrazy]

Ha ha ha! And here I am talking about the end of the world in another thread (Glowing Mary). Ha ha ha! -dances- World's gonna end, world's gonna end!


Oh well...at least we'll get a nice pretty image of Mars before we go. ~_^

[Valen]

[QUOTE][i]Originally posted by Shinji Ikari [/i]
[B][size=1] "there will be signs in the heavens at the end of the age"
Matthew 24

Also, it says that "the moon will turn a blood red" - Revelation.
. Perhaps, John the apostle, writing in the first century, saw a Mars in our atmosphere as a blood red moon.
This + Grand Alignment 2000 + catastrophict tides and weather = Signs in the heavens.

Biblicalness is not a word I don't think ;)[/size] [/B][/QUOTE]

:p! Hmm, that sounds pretty interesting, seeing as there was a blood moon tonight/last night(it's 4:30am here). In the old times, it was also a sign of something bad approaching for the Wicca/Pagan community. They, too, saw it as a sign from the heavens... This could get interesting...

[quote]Ha ha ha! And here I am talking about the end of the world in another thread (Glowing Mary). Ha ha ha! -dances- World's gonna end, world's gonna end!


Oh well...at least we'll get a nice pretty image of Mars before we go. ~_^[/quote]

That we do hehe... wouldnt be all bad if the world ended... we'd..er... our spirits would just have to find another planet to be reincarnated on. ~_^

[Fall]

I actually read about this in the newspaper. If it [i]does[/i] get close enough to see any good detail of its surface, I'll most likely stay up for a while and stare at it. :drunk:

[GrimmFang]

I can't wait to check this out. I also can't wait to see if the world ends. Maybe this prophecy about the world ending will actually come true for a change.

[Corey]

Well if the world ends I'd be rather dissapointed that I never owned a CD Burner.

I'm definitly going to stay up for it, even though I'm going to be on vacation.

*readies telescope*

I've always been entranced by Mars.

[stormy_weather]

i've already seen it yesterday looks really cool.i have a telescope to look at it through and it looked super red which is the only reason i could find it in the sky.*bad at finding things people usually have to point them out for me*

[Dragonballzman]

Meh. To be honest, it doesn't sound that interesting. I've never been that amazed by space. I mean, yeah, Mars is gonna be the closest to us in thousands of years, which [I]is[/I] pretty cool, but to me it's still gonna be just a big fat rock light years away from us. >_>

[the The Boy]

Umm.... Dragonballzman Mars isn't light years away from us. It's closer than the Sun and it only takes light 6-8 minutes to reach Earth from the Sun.
On topic. Cool I didn't hear that. Darn you now I'll be standing in my yard staring at the sky for hours.

[Valen]

Hahaha DBZMan, think about it... we're just one small microscopic dot in a vast universe that has all kinds of wonderous things going on. It's truely amazing if you think about it... and kind of spooky too...

[Dragonballzman]

[QUOTE][i]Originally posted by the The Boy [/i]
[B]Umm.... Dragonballzman Mars isn't light years away from us. It's closer than the Sun and it only takes light 6-8 minutes to reach Earth from the Sun.[/B][/QUOTE]

Meh, whatever. That just shows how much I don't know and don't really care about space. ^^;;

[Guest Crimson Spider]

Um... I just watched the news. I kinda had to since they intterupted my regular scheduald programming.

To get to the point, the power is out on the northeastern side of the country. No one knows why.

I have a theory. You see, there are certain areas that lie on granite and other metals reservers, which are highly electro-magnetically conductive, are prone to have mysterious power-outages when something messes with the electromagnetic field i.e. a solar flare hitting earth. It causes the power to just short out, and flicker on on occasions, similar to what's happening over in the New York area. I don't know if that is where it is, but I believe that the electromagnetic fields of our closest neighbor and us are sorta colliding, causing the field to go out of wack, and cause a sort of EMP, or EMS to be more accurate. Reserve generators are working right now to barely keep the city working.

Now, I'm glad that Las Vegas is on Sandstone, and other non-conductive rock and materials, because if the power were to go out here, many would die of heat exaustion. Only those who nativly lived here for all their lives, and drink a lot of water... not soda mind you, but water could live.

I'm supprised that there isn't a topic on the outages of America already.

[Baron Samedi]

Wow. The 27th you say? Ill definitely watch that. I think that space is really awesome, and I would love to have a telescope. But knowing me, id be too lazy to use it much. and put it in the spare room o.0. Anyway, ill be sure to keep an eye out for it... Thanks for telling me.

****EDIT****
Crimson Spider, on the news this morning they said that the outages were because of Power Transmitters in Ohio going down. So you dont really need to worry, i dont think...
***EDIT****