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Wednesday, August 1, 2018 The Nugget Newspaper, Sisters, Oregon
Mars is bright in the Sisters sky
By Jim Anderson
Correspondent
Mars appears brighter in
Sisters’ night sky — but only
for about a month. It appears
as a large aircraft navigation
light, but not moving across
the night sky like an airliner.
Let’s take a look at our
neighbor planet. It’s very
cold there’ with an average
temperature of -80 degrees
Fahrenheit. Do you remember
the winter of 1958 in Central
Oregon when it went down
to 36 below at night? Now
imagine 80 below.
Then there’s the dust
storms. They can cover the
entire planet at the same
time. There are also rocky,
deep canyons, volcanoes and
craters all over the planet. It
has clouds and wind, just like
earth, but volcanic dust is in
the air constantly.
Mars has about one-third
the gravity of Earth. That
means a rock dropped on
Mars would fall slower than
a rock dropped on Earth, and
stuff on Mars weighs less
than stuff here. A paerson in
a diet living on Mars could
think they were successful
in the efforts to lose weight.
If you weighed 100 pounds
here, you’d only weigh 37
pounds on Mars.
Mars is our second-closest
neighbor. Fiction about Mars
has been part of the culture
for over a century. “War of
the Worlds” is probably one
of the best-known books
about the Red Planet. It doc-
uments the destruction of
England by Martians in 1910.
But even before that in 1890,
“Urania,” written by Camille
Flammarion, told of two lov-
ers killed in a ballooning
accident being reincarnated
in new bodies on Mars.
“Gulliver of Mars,” by
Edwin L. Arnold must have
inspired some of NASA’s
great Mars adventures: A
space adventurer by the name
of Gulliver Jones got there
from Earth on a flying/magic
carpet and interacted with
natives, Hithers and Thithers.
And there’s the huge sci-
ence fiction hoax of Mars in
our age that took place in the
year 2016 when a story got
started that Mars was going
to appear in the night sky
as large as the Moon dur-
ing the opposition that year.
Obviously, those who wit-
nessed the Red Planet’s close
approach to Earth last week
saw it as the little red orb in
the sky it is.
Earth and Mars both travel
around the Sun on wob-
bly, elliptical orbits, which
causes their relationship to
each other in space to change.
However, every few years
their orbits align. When this
takes place, Mars is said to
be at opposition, because the
Red Planet and the Sun are
located on opposite sides of
Earth.
For we residents of Earth,
that means when the Sun sets
in the west, Mars appears to
rise in the east. That’s why
the Red Planet appears to be
brighter and brighter each
night as the planet makes its
closest approach to Earth. It
will come within a mere 35.8
millions miles, but as you
read this, it’s moving away
from Earth and will dim to
it’s usual radiance by the end
of August.
But we have an opportu-
nity at the end of this month:
Mars will appear in the
southeastern horizon
at about sundown
to join Saturn in
the night sky. If
you set up for
a long visit
with Mars
and Saturn
with bin-
oculars or
telescope,
around mid-
night both
planets will
be quite vis-
ible; Saturn’s
customary golden
color, and Mars its
usual red, caused by
the rust in the volcanic
soils.
NASA has used both
spacecraft and roaming robots
You meet the
nicest people…
to help us learn more about
Mars. In 1965, “Mariner 4”
was flown close to Mars to
help us get a closer look at the
Red Planet. Then, in 1976,
Viking 1 and Viking 2 were
the first spacecraft to land on
the surface of Mars. The pho-
tos they provided us gave us
our first up-close look at our
neighbor.
In 2004 we really took
some very close looks at what
Mars is all about, even dis-
covering evidence of water.
Recently, NASA confirmed
evidence that liquid water
flows beneath Mars’ surface.
PHOTO COURTESY NASA
Mars, the Red Planet.
…at The
Hair Caché!
OSU Extension offers
skin nourishment tips
Living on Oregon’s High
Desert brings special chal-
lenges for maintaining
healthy skin. Learn how you
can nourish your skin at an
interactive public workshop
at the Oregon State Univer-
sity Extension Service office
in Redmond. The session will
be held Wednesday, August 8,
from 1 to 4 p.m. Cost is $10.
Participants will enjoy
hands-on activities and dis-
cussions, recipe preparation
and sampling. The lesson
includes handouts and health-
ful recipes to take home.
Additionally, these classes
meet the Health Engagement
Model (HEM) health educa-
tion requirement for some
insurance companies.
This lesson will help
people 50 and older develop
strategies to help maintain
their skin in healthy aging.
Any adult can benefit from
the information. It is part of
the “Nourishing Boomers and
Beyond” series.
The program may also
help you to:
• Relieve stress.
• Learn ways to stretch
your food dollars and still
serve tasty, nutritious meals.
• Get reliable, research-
based information to help
you sort out fact from fic-
tion when you’re looking for
health information.
• Learn more about pre-
scription and nonprescription
medications and how food
can interact with them.
“Our goal is to provide
nutrition and overall well-
ness education with optional,
online support to help adults
sustain a healthy lifestyle,”
said Glenda Hyde, OSU
Extension faculty.
Call the OSU Extension
office in Deschutes County
by Monday, August 6 at 541-
548-6088 to register. Class
size is limited. For more
information, contact Glenda.
hyde@oregonstate.edu.
Oregon State University
Extension Service prohibits
discrimination in all its pro-
grams, services, activities,
and materials on the basis of
race, color, national origin,
religion, sex, gender identity
(including gender expres-
sion), sexual orientation,
disability, age, marital sta-
tus, familial/parental status,
income derived from a public
assistance program, politi-
cal beliefs, genetic informa-
tion, veteran’s status, reprisal
or retaliation for prior civil
rights activity. (Not all pro-
hibited bases apply to all pro-
grams.) Requests related to
a disability should be made
by July 25, 2018 to Glenda
Hyde, 541-548-6088, glenda.
hyde@oregonstate.edu.
Do you know your agent?
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free Farmers Friendly Review
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AUTO • HOME • LIFE • BUSINESS
Tour the Old West through
ou
ugh
THE ART OF LEN BABB
Len Babb Western Art Exhibit
bi it & Sale
re Hall
Sat., Aug. 4 • 9 a.m. to 8 p.m. at Sisters Fi
Fire
Meet the artist • Enjoy live music & refreshments
en
nts
www.lenbabbwesternart.com • 541-815-3422