Mars closest encounter with the earth in almost 60,000 years...

[Guest guest]

For those of you who live out in the country, enjoy!

This is the link if you want to see the maps.

http://www.space.com/spacewatch/where_is_mars.html

Mars Watch: Closer than Ever This Week

By Joe Rao

Special to SPACE.com

On Aug. 27 at 5:51 a.m. ET (1051 GMT) Mars will be less than 34.65

million miles (55.76 million kilometers) away -- closer than it's

been in 59,619 years.

Finding the Red Planet

The Roman God of War is easy to spot. It is the unmistakable beacon

of the evening sky, in the southeast. It is high in the south around

midnight and low in the southwest near dawn. [Maps]

Mars outshines all stars now.

It rises near sunset for skywatchers at mid-northern latitudes. If

your horizon is obstructed, it might be a bit later later before you

can find it. [Timetables]

What You'll See

The planet usually appears orange or slightly red, though sometimes --

depending conditions in Earth's atmosphere -- it can look yellowish.

Mars began August shining at magnitude -2.3. On this astronomers'

scale, larger numbers mean dimmer objects. Negative numbers are

reserved for the brightest objects.

Except for Venus (which can be magnitude -4.0 and brighter) no other

planet or star can be brighter than Mars is now. Now through Sept. 2,

Mars glimmers at magnitude -2.9 -- as bright as it can be. [Observing

tips]

Telescopes and photography

To the naked eye, Mars is a point of light, like a bright star. To

see surface features, you'll need a telescope with a lens at least

70mm in diameter for the refractor type, or 4.25 inches for a

reflector. [Telescope buying guide]

Middle-of-the-night observations are best, because Mars is at its

highest in our sky, and so its light cuts through less atmosphere and

arrives less distorted. Digital cameras can be used to make

photographs, even by hand-holding them to a telescope eyepiece.

[Photo Tips]