let's go to mars hey there stargazers
I'm James Albury director of the key
cassava plop planetarium in Gainesville
Florida and I'm Dean Regas astronomer
for the Cincinnati Observatory we're
here to help you find your way around
the sky the planet Mars is back in the
nighttime sky and looking big bright and
beautiful and read exactly currently we
have several unmanned spacecraft
circling Mars and to you rolling on mars
so it got us thinking what would it be
like to visit mars up close in person so
this week will show you where to find
mars in the earthly sky and then take
you on a journey across millions of
miles to the red planet so let's get ok
we have asked I set up for Thursday June
16th facing south where close the summer
solstice so it doesn't get really dark
until after 10 p.m. so our view here is
at 11 p.m. I love any excuse to stay up
late with the stars and planets and
there's a lot to see in the southern sky
this week on Thursday will be having the
waxing gibbous moon above Harz yep that
bright reddish star is actually the red
planet cool and it's so easy to find
right now over to the left you'll spot
to fainter objects the dinner one is the
star Antares the beating heart of the
constellation Scorpius Scorpion and the
broader one on the left is the ringed
planet Saturn my favorite but I'll stay
focused on mars since that's our
destination today
good idea but first let's see how things
change over the week on Friday night the
moon will shift to the left and on
Saturday night it will cozy up next to
saturn nice then on Sunday and Monday
the moon will continue on its way but
still leave our two planets and one
bright shining star to the south now
comes the fun part let's blast off from
ours and take you in for a closer look
this week marks is almost 50 million
miles from Earth and Mars are properly
position it takes a rock at about seven
months to make the trip but will get you
there in a few seconds as we approach
the red planet will first notice that
it's not super red it looks more orange
brown pink and rusty and that's because
there's a lot of honor in the ranks of
mars that actually have rusted over time
the bright white areas are the polar ice
caps there's lots of dry ice around the
martian polls but also a fair amount of
water rights maybe we can ship off a few
pieces and add them to our drinks before
we land let's fly by Mars is to first up
is da most the smaller on its left at
eight miles across and circle the planet
every 30 hours then we come to the
larger moon Phobos it's still very small
only about 14 miles why despite being
covered in creators photos might make a
great base of operations for future
manned missions it could be a stopover
for astronauts or an orbiting
observatory to watch the planet more
closely someday astronaut space shuttle
down to Mars and back from this little
moon alright we made it when the first
humans to reach the surface of mars and
what have you
most of ours looks like a dry desolate
orange desert with rocks strewn about
and deep craters any water on Mars is
hidden below the brown or is frozen in
the ice caps but you can also find tall
mountains like Olympus months which is
three times taller than any Mountaineers
and deep valleys like valise Mariners
which is 2500 miles long and five times
deeper than the Grand Canyon plus
there's two Rover still rolling on mars
hey look there's the Curiosity rover
climbing Mount sharp a curiosity we may
still be decades away from sending
humans to Mars but one can always dream
so this week look for Mars in the
southern sky after dark and when you
find a dream about taking a journey to
the red planet you can visit it's two
moons and kick up some red Martian dust
it's all there when you keep looking up