Mars attacks: Opposition 8 April 2014

[starfinder]

The once in 2 years Opposition of Mars is just a month away! Opposition would be on 8 April 2014 UT (9 April 2014 Singapore time).

At this year's Opposition, Mars would appear 15.1 arc seconds wide, bigger than it was in the last 2 Oppositions.

Mars certainly deserves our efforts to view it in the next several weeks. Not to be missed!

I observed Mars last night through my 12.5" Dob. Even at 360x, Mars appeared very small (consider that Jupiter is typically about 40 arc seconds wide). I could see some of the more prominent albedo features of Mars, including Syrtis Major and Utopia, and a very tiny North Polar cap, and what was either the South Polar Cap or a white cloud over the south polar region.

Most interestingly, I could distinctly see a fairly large white patch in the mid-latitudes region, near the edge of the globe. I think it must be a cloud.

Jiahao has suggested that I try spotting the volcanic mountain Olympus Mons (at about CM 130 deg) in an eyepiece. I think it would be quite difficult considering how tiny it would appear. Hmm... will give it a try.

Below is an image which I took at about the same time last night / this morning through a Meade LX-90 8" SCT (with a 3x barlow). A stack of about the 60 best frames. Image is only so-so.

Mars. 07 March 2014 18:29 UTC. Central meridian = 272 deg. Diameter = 12.3". South is up. The large dark feature in the upper half of the image is Syrtis Major.

[Canopus Lim]

That is good news. Yes Mars is still so small. Observed it more than a month back with my 12.5 inch.

[Gary]

Nice pic and report!

[starfinder]

I did some more observing of Mars last night. Through the LX-90 8" SCT at 285x and 444x, I tried but could not see Olympus Mons. However, the white North Polar Cap seemed more prominent than it was about a fortnight ago.

Anyway, I managed to obtain an improved image of Mars. Here it is. I've added some annotations of the visible features; hope I've got it correct! North is up.

What's interesting is the haze or clouds in the tropical region, near the (eastern) edge of the globe. And Olympus Mons too!

Details:
Date/time: 22 March 2014 1630UTC.
CM=110 deg. Diameter 14.0". Distance to Earth = 0.67AU (100.4 million km). Mag -1.1. 17 days to Opposition.
Meade LX-90 8" SCT with 2x barlow. ASI120MC imager.
1654 frames stacked in Registax 6, colour balanced with Photoshop.

[Gary]

Nice capture with annotations! Thanks for sharing.

[starfinder]

This evening (Mon 25 Mar 2014), I viewed Mars through my Obsession 12.5" dob (OMI mirror), the first viewing thru the dob in a few weeks.

The views of Mars were the best ever that I've had. I viewed it at 356x magnification (4.5mm Delos), 480x (10mm Delos with 3x apo barlow), and at a ridiculously high power of 711x (4.5mm Delos with 2x apo barlow). The image remained clear with no image breakdown even at 711x. The seeing was very good.

The main constraining factor was persistent strong winds at my balcony. These seemed to conspire with the low level passing clouds to blow strongly whenever the clouds cleared, and to only stop when a nice round cloud blocked the planet! Over the 2 hr session from 10.45pm to 12.45am, I only had jiggle free views for about 10% of the time.

Nevertheless, the views were sublime. The north polar cap was a small but bright plain white oval and sharply defined against a dark round ring which surrounded it. Various other dark regions were viewed throughout the globe.

The northern hemisphere appeared to have a lighter more orangey hue than the southern half. A thick white squarish haze or cloud could be seen at the central eastern edge of the globe, and this appeared to continue, in a much thinner and more translucent form, along most of the entire equatorial region to the other edge of the globe.

I can also report that after looking for it very closely, I managed to view Olympus Mons! This dormant volcano was about 1/6th of the way from the western edge of the globe. At 711x, Olympus Mons appeared as a very small light round patch surrounded by a much wider and slightly darker ring. I viewed it from around 12.15am to 12.45am. According to my PlanetDroid app for Android, Mars' central meridian was then at 88 deg to 96 deg, with the globe having an apparent diameter of 14.1", and at mag -1.2. The volcano object was where it was supposed to be, according to the charts (e.g. SkySafari app).

I also managed to see another similar but smaller object nearby, nearer the central meridian. Looking at the charts, I think it was another volcanic cone, Ascraeus Mons, in the Tharsis Montes chain.

I must say that with Mars at only 14", pushing up the power really helped, and at 711x, Mars appeared similar to Jupiter size-wise when at 250x.

There! Despite the strong winds, it was all in all quite a fruitful observing session of the Red Planet.

[antares2063]

Amazing report on Mars...i can't imagine 711x thru your dob!

Regards,
Junwei

[Gary]

When excellent observational skills meets good seeing meets large aperture telescope! Nice report!

[Canopus Lim]

Tonight the seeing was pretty good. Managed to use 530x magnification with sharp image of Mars; using 12.5" Obsession Telescope with Zambuto mirror + 2x TV barlow + 6 Delos. Attached is a sketch of what I have made. Pretty good details and happy with the view.

http://postimg.org/image/5puposemn/

[Gary]

Tonight the seeing was pretty good. Managed to use 530x magnification with sharp image of Mars; using 12.5" Obsession Telescope with Zambuto mirror + 2x TV barlow + 6 Delos. Attached is a sketch of what I have made. Pretty good details and happy with the view.

http://postimg.org/image/5puposemn/

Beautiful sketch. Lots of details! Thanks for sharing.