Did You See It? Odd Light Near the Moon

[certified psycho]

If you happen to look up at the night sky this week, you may see a weird, glowing dot of light next to the moon. What IS it? It's Mars. Don't say you never get to see anything cool. Mars and Earth are moving closer together over the next few weeks, and on August 27, the two planets will be the closest they have been since 60,000 and 73,000 years ago. And you can witness it. Call it a close encounter of the Mars kind.

[Janus58]

For those interested, here's a little explanation of the above.

Mars has a fairly eccentric orbit. Thus it moves in and out from the Sun quite a bit as it orbits the Sun. Because of this, the distance between Mars and the Earth at opposition, (when the Earth and Mars line up with each other on the same side of the Sun), varys from 35 million to 63 million miles. (The distance between Earth and Mars varies between 35 and 247 million miles while they are at various points in their orbits.) When these oppositions occur around Aug. 25th, the distance will be the smallest.
As oppositions happen about every 780 days (2.19 yrs), close oppostions happen about every fifteen or seventeen years.
Even with close oppostions, the distance can vary, depending upon how close the opposition comes to occuring on just the right date.

Circumstances are now leading up to one of the closest of the close oppositions.