Aliens On Earth.com Resources for those who are stranded here Our Bookstore is OPEN Over 5000 new & used titles, competitively priced! Topics: UFOs - Paranormal - Area 51 - Ghosts - Forteana - Conspiracy - History - Biography - Psychology - Religion - Crime - Health - Geography - Maps - Science - Money - Language - Recreation - Technology - Fiction - Other - New Search... for keyword(s)   in Page Titles in Book Title/Author in Contents of Pages ---other searches--- Metacrawler Yahoo FAST Search Google Altavista Dogpile Inference Find Northern Light IWon.com MSN Search Las Vegas Sun Location: Mothership -> UFO -> Updates -> 1997 -> Dec -> Re: Rare Planetary Alignment And Other Celestial

UFO UpDates Mailing List

From: Stig_Agermose@online.pol.dk (Stig Agermose)
Date: Fri, 5 Dec 1997 11:25:49 +0200
Fwd Date: Fri, 05 Dec 1997 12:16:37 -0500
Subject: Re: Rare Planetary Alignment And Other Celestial

Found at

http://www.sfgate.com:80/cgi-bin/examiner/article.cgi?year=3D1997&month=3D12
&day=3D02&article=3DNEWS11720.dtl


Tuesday, Dec. 2, 1997 =B7 Page A 1 =A91997 San Francisco Examiner


Jupiter aligns with Mars - and moon, Venus and Mercury

Stargazers have treats in store throughout month


Keay Davidson
EXAMINER SCIENCE WRITER


A celestial parade of planets is enlivening the evening sky.

On Tuesday evening, the crescent moon and four planets cluster in the
southwestern heavens, just after sunset.

The unusual grouping of worlds - the moon, Mars, Venus, Jupiter and
Mercury - is an illusion. In reality, they are many millions of miles
apart. However, they lie in approximately the same direction, which
creates the illusion of alignment.

"Watching from the Marina would be good," says Bob Havlen, a
professional astronomer who is also executive director of the
6,000-member Astronomical Society of the Pacific in San Francisco.

Tuesday evening's display is an impressive start to a month of
astronomical wonders. Parents who plan to buy their youngsters a small
telescope or a strong pair of binoculars for the holidays couldn't have
picked a better time.

Also ahead this month:

*On the night of Dec. 8-9, the moon passes over or "occults" Saturn,
the ringed planet. Through telescopes, Saturn will appear to wink out
as the dark limb of the moon moves over it. Later Saturn will emerge
from behind the illuminated side of the moon.

Saturn will be "a wondrous target for telescopes, with its rings tilted
9 degrees," says the current issue of Sky & Telescope magazine.

And the moon, of course, is a marvel for telescopic viewing - like a
dead Earth, complete with mountain ranges and dried seas of lava,
billions of years old.

*On Dec. 11, the planet Venus will be brilliant - 16 times as bright as
Sirius. Sirius is the brightest star visible at night from the Northern
Hemisphere. That evening, newspapers and police departments should
expect to receive excited calls from the public, who will inquire about
the UFO toward the southwest.

*On the night of Dec. 12-13, the full moon will occult the bright red
star Aldebaran.

*On Dec. 21 and 22, Venus and Mars, the Red Planet, will pass close to
each other - just 1.1 degrees apart. By comparison, the full moon is a
half-degree wide.

On Tuesday night, the moon's slender crescent will lie very low in the
southwest just after sunset. To the left will be an orange-red "star,"
actually the planet Mars.

On Wednesday evening, the moon will hang just above Venus. Venus is
brilliant mainly because it is perpetually shrouded in clouds of
sulfuric acid. Also, Venus is the second-closest planet to the sun. The
surface temperature of Venus is about 800 degrees Fahrenheit.

By Thursday night, the moon will have fattened from a skinny crescent
to a fairly plump one. To its left in the evening sky will be Jupiter,
a "gas giant" swept by hurricanes bigger than Earth.

All week, keen-eyed stargazers may see the tiny world Mercury - the
closest planet to the sun - barely above the southwestern horizon. It's
extremely hard to see, though, and may be hopelessly shrouded by
low-level fog.

If you can't see it, don't feel bad. One of history's most famous
astronomers, Nicolaus Copernicus - who showed in the 16th century that
Earth orbits the sun, not vice versa - lived his entire life in Poland
without once glimpsing little Mercury.