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what's up for march

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the sun

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and mercury

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hello and welcome i'm jane houston jones

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at nasa's jet propulsion laboratory in

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pasadena california

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on march 18th nasa's messenger

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spacecraft is scheduled to be inserted

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into orbit around mercury

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it will be the first spacecraft to orbit

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to get there messenger traveled through

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the inner solar system flying by earth

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once venus twice and mercury three times

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the spacecraft used the gravity of venus

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to resize and rotate its flight path

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closer to mercury's orbit in 2006 and

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2007.

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messenger experienced many extreme

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conditions during its nearly 5 billion

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mile journey to mercury

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you can see elusive mercury for yourself

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this month too

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look for mercury next to larger and

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brighter jupiter 45 minutes after sunset

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all month long

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they'll look like two bright stars very

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low on the western horizon

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on mercury orbit insertion day march

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18th you can see mercury to the upper

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right of jupiter

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and on the 19th join your local

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astronomy club or science center as they

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this year offers solar observers a

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myriad of amazing features

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but take care and never look directly at

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the sun or you'll damage your eyes

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through special solar safe telescope

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filters you can see sunspots on the sun

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if you see any large sunspot groups try

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to observe them over several days

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you may be able to see them march across

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the sun's photosphere as our star

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rotates

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flares that explode

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and prominences that sometimes erupt

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into space from the sun can be seen with

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special h alpha filters

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these special narrowband filters isolate

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only the hydrogen alpha wavelengths

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this filter blocks all the other colors

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of light and reveals the sun's

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chromosphere

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you can learn more about sun earth day

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events and hands-on activities at

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solarsystem.nasa.gov

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yss which stands for year of the solar

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system and you can learn all about nasa

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missions at www.nasa.gov