If you are blessed with clear skies this hebdomad , you could overhear Mars at its best and bright . The Red Planet and Earth are currently at the closest space they will be for another 15 years . It can be see this week as a vindicated red dot tight to the Moon , the crimson chromaticity of the celestial eubstance seeable even without binoculars or a telescope .
The two planets will be about 62.1 million kilometer ( 38.6 million miles ) apart , with the closest point fall out on Tuesday , October 6 . Mars wo n’t get as close to us again until the year 2035 .
It ’s not the closest that it has gotten in recent year – in 2018 , Earth and Mars were just 57.6 million kilometers ( 35.8 million miles ) from each other – but it ’s still reasonably close .
The stuffy distance recorded was back in 2003 when Mars was 55.7 million kilometer ( 34.6 million miles ) away . This length was the confining the two planets have been in60,000 year , and we will have to wait untilAugust 28 , 2287for this record to be get out .
This is still not the closest space possible . That would happen when Earth is at its aphelion , the furthest point from the Sun in a planet ’s orbit , and Mars is at its perihelion , the tight detail to the Sun . That limited alignment would take the two planet to a distance of just 54.6 million kilometers ( 33.9 million mi ) , but it has never been show yet .
The antonym of the closest approach is when the two satellite are at their aphelion on opposite sides of the Sun . The uttermost distance that they can be is about 401 million kilometers ( 250 million miles ) apart .
The next tight approaching will be in two geezerhood , but the gap between the two major planet will become great and larger until 2029 . Despite this , every close attack is an exciting period for aeronautics . Space agency around the world clip the launch of commission to Mars to go on when the distance between the two planets is smallest , so the traveling time is short . Three missions were sent this summer , includingNASA ’s Perseverance rover .
TheRosalind Franklin Rover , a joint mission from the European Space Agency and Russia ’s Roscosmos , was also due to launch this summertime but had to be put back due to the pandemic . It is bear to vanish in the next launch windowpane in late 2022 .
