Close Encounter with the red planet, MARS.

Mars, our most discussed red planet will have his closest encounter with earth at about 43 Million miles (69 Million Km) on 31st Oct 2005 at 0319 Universal time.

Such a event in near past was in August 2003, when Orbits of earth and mars were in closest possible configuration at about 34.6 Million Miles. The average distance between these two planetary objects is about 140 Million Miles.

Compare to Aug 2003 event, the last time Mars was this close to the Earth was in the year 57,537 B.C. The next approach this close will be on August 28, 2287. So the 2003 opposition was a once in many lifetimes
opportunity to view the red planet at this close distance, so Aug 2003 was unique opportunity to observe the red planet in the recorded history.

These events are due to orbital dynamics of earth and mars in our solar system. Earth Orbits in the inner circle, revolves around the center nearly twice (1.88 times) as fast as mars. Earth takes around 365 days and mars takes nearly double of it. Due to this ratio in their orbital dynamics earth witness such close encounters once in every two years (in every 26 months). So if we have missed watching mars in Aug 2003 its time again to witness the close encounter on 31st October 2005.

Considering the average distance of mars from earth, the red planet is in the close vicinity since may this year. We all remember the beautiful sighting on 31st of May when mars and moon were seen together prominently on the particular night. Now this traveling together will witness the closest encounter on 31st of October, the naked eye appearance of Mars will be that of a bright, yellowish-orange star rising in the east at sunset and rising overhead at midnight.

We all heard about Mars will be seen as big as moon in Aug 2005, i heard it from a business journalist friend of mine calling me early morning. This is a mistake spread all across internet community, we can call it a email hoax. Such emails have their own evolution period and in this case it has evolved and settle down on date "Aug 27th 2005, Mars will make closest approach to earth in recorded history and we will be able to see the red planet as big as moon."

Phenomenon in the email hoax is known as Mars opposition in astronomical terminology and such close opposition is not possible fortunately. If somehow this configuration is possible, the outcomes would be far dangerous to recently seen Tsunami disasters and floods in Mumbai. Such close encounter with mars will also disturb the orbits of both earth and moon resulting chaos for life on earth.

Mars opposition is a configuration of planetary objects to each other in such a way that the sun and mars are opposed to each other relative to earth. To put it simply the sun sets in the west, mars rises in the east.

Unlike the internet community, NASA always launched their rovers in these periods for mars expeditions. Two NASA rovers launched in 2003, Spirit and Opportunity. Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO) launched in 11th Aug 2005. The Phoenix lander is currently scheduled to launch in 2007 and touchdown in the planet’s polar region. A large rover, the Mars Science Laboratory, is expected to launch in 2009.

So as of now we are rushing towards mars on a circular race track with a relative speed of 23,500 mph. We won't come in lane with mars until October 31st at 0319 universal time. To be precise in Only 43 million miles (69 million km) will separate us from Mars, then, compared to an average distance of about 140 million miles (225 million kilometers). So its a great time to see our red planet in the vicinity.