Inaccuracies

I recently read the article “Hello Mars” in yesterday’s edition of The Blount Countian and I want to point out some inaccuracies. The information presented is 6 years out of date. The closest alignment of the perihelio of Mars with the aphelion of Earth last occurred on Aug. 27, 2003. And though the planets come close to one another approximately every 2 years, there is nothing spectacular about Mars occurring this month.

There has been an e-mail circulating every year since the 2003 event which claims that Mars will be close, but never really giving a year, which means that this e-mail will probably continue to circulate for some time. I started to fall for this e-mail myself when I first saw it two years ago.

Here are some web pages for your journalistic verification. http://space.about.com/library/weekly/blmarsclose.htm

www.snopes.com/science/astronomy/brightmars.asp

A google search with the terms “mars close 2009” will show dozens of articles detailing that this is a hoax.

In addition, there was a discrepancy about the length of a Martian year, which is approximately 687 days long instead of 487 (q. v. http://www.universetoday.com/guideto space/mars/how-long-is-a-year-on-mars/).

Dack Phillips

Oneonta