Mars turns a blind eye . . .

. . . or something like that.

Amateur astronomers have been eagerly anticipating this summer when Mars will be closer to Earth than at any other time in our lifetime. Yet just at this critical juncture a dust storm has kicked up on the red planet and it looks like all the delicate features that would have been visible in a small telescope will be obscured. Bummer! This is the way Sky and Telescope put it lat night in it's newsletter:

To quote the baseball great Yogi Berra, "It's déjà vu all over again." This summer Mars will be the brightest it will ever be in our lifetimes. But just as in 2001, the last time Mars was bright in the sky, a global dust storm threatens to block out all observable surface features.

Veteran Mars observer Donald C. Parker reports that significant changes have taken place on Mars in the last 72 hours. On Wednesday, Parker said, "I'd call it a dust cloud, not a dust storm." But after looking at images from Thursday morning, July 3rd, his outlook was far more bleak....

For more details go here.

Posted by Greg Stone at July 4, 2003 05:24 AM