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Saturday is the free public party at the Park at River Walk organized by the Kern Astronomical Society. The sighting will begin a little before sunset watching the increasing gibbous moon. As the sky darkens, take a look at Venus and Jupiter, then at Saturn. Towards the end of the Star Festival (around 10 pm), you could see Mars through the telescopes.
Mars gets up just after sundown Saturday night. It is heading towards "the opposition" on July 27 when Mars will be directly in front of the sun on our sky as the Earth passes directly between the sun and Mars in our inner orbit. This occurs every two years and 50 days (or a total of 780 days). Since the moment of opposition is 50 days and the orbits of the Earth and Mars are not perfect circles and their orbits are tilted one to the other (and, …), some oppositions are closer than others.
Every 15 or 17 years, the opposition of Mars occurs near its perihelion, when the planet is closest to the sun. During these oppositions, Mars may be particularly close to us and appear very bright, even brighter than Jupiter! It happens this year. The previous "perihelic opposition" was produced in late August 2003. The opposition of 2003 was extremely close – the closest in nearly 60,000 years (59,619 years to be more precise). The closing approach this month will be about 3% farther (or about 1.1 million miles) than the close approach of 2003.
You will likely see the "Mars Hoax "Appear soon (if not already) in your email or on your favorite social networking site that says Mars will appear as big as the full moon. The hoax appears around every opposition Mars. If Mars was getting so close to the moon, the tides of Mars would be about 86% of the tidal force of the moon, which would really spoil the tides of the ocean around the world, not to mention the Shit the moon's orbit around the earth and change our orbit around the sun. The Mars Hoax is just bad on a variety of levels.
So, what kind of things about Mars can you see through telescopes KAS at this approach? At the moment when I write this, Mars is still plagued by a global dust storm, so the answer could be, "Not much beyond a big orange ball with a hint of polar white hood." " If the storm clears, then all sorts of bright, dark features could be seen. The Mars Profiler from Sky & Telescope at https://is.gd/marsprofiler will help you identify the features.
If Mars is washed out, take a look at Saturn, who is still beautiful, or Jupiter. Hercules will be fresh up, so the globular cluster, M13, will be easy to see. This is one of my favorites. The Lyra ring nebula will also be high
Pyrenees Party, another fun in France
I've been lucky enough to see M13 and the Ring Nebula during A short (too short!) Evening at the Peak of the Observatory of the South three weeks ago. The visit of the observatory was part of a planetarium conference in France. The observatory, located in the Pyrenees in the south of France, is over 9,400 feet above sea level and the air is very stable, so the images are sharp. One of the Pic du Midi telescopes was used to take high-resolution images of the moon in preparation for the Apollo missions.
When our group arrived at the ski village at the foot of the mountain, we were very worried because the sky was gray and foggy. We took a gondola on the slope through the clouds. When we rose above the clouds in the glorious sun, applause and shouts of joy broke out. We could see a beautiful sunset but we had to leave before the sky was really dark. I have discovered that it is possible to rent a room at the observatory and the food and wine are excellent, so my next visit will be a night (or two).
With the usual presentations on the equipment and techniques of the planetarium, there have been discussions on astronomy research. A discussion focused on the future of interplanetary missions until 2068. This year was chosen because it includes the next halley comet pass in our neighborhood (in 2061) and 2068 will be the centenary of the movie "2001: A Space Odyssey." [19659003] One of the cool plans in the next 50 years is to send a 3D printer to a small asteroid and ask him to use the asteroid hardware to create the engines of Rocket on the surface of the asteroid and housing quarters inside the asteroid. provide the shielding of solar radiation. Many asteroids have a large amount of hydrated minerals from which water can be extracted. If technology can be developed, we will not need to lift large masses of material from the Earth's surface and we will be able to jump, jump and jump into the solar system!
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