CFHT CLOUD CAM TIME LAPSE FEBRUARY 29-MARCH 1, 2012 MARS AT OPPOSITION: Mars is approaching opposition. On March 3-5, the Red Planet will be up all night long, opposite the sun and as close to Earth as it will get in 2012. Mars shines overhead at midnight 6 times brighter than a 1st magnitude star and looks great through a backyard telescope Mars is at opposition on Saturday, when it lines up opposite the Sun in our sky. For several nights around opposition, it rises at sunset, climbs high across the sky during the night, and sets at sunrise. It is brightest for the year, too. Earth and Mars, like all the other planets in the solar system, orbit the sun in elliptical orbits. Because our planet is closer to the sun than Mars, it races along its orbit more quickly. Earth makes two trips around the sun in about the same amount of time it takes Mars to make one trip. Earth has been racing toward Mars for months, gaining on the Red Planet by more than 200000 miles each day. We wi! ll finally catch up to Mars and pass relatively close to it this weekend. From our perspective on our spinning world, whenever Earth is between the sun and a planet, the planet will rise in the east just as the sun sets in the west. Then, after staying up in the sky the entire night, the planet will set in the west just as the sun rises in the east. Because the planet and the sun appear on opposite sides of the sky, we say that the planet is in "opposition." Mars is named after the ancient Roman god of ...
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