[HN Gopher] What does the night sky look like on Mars?
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       What does the night sky look like on Mars?
        
       Author : ohjeez
       Score  : 41 points
       Date   : 2021-01-26 21:13 UTC (1 hours ago)
        
 (HTM) web link (www.skyatnightmagazine.com)
 (TXT) w3m dump (www.skyatnightmagazine.com)
        
       | Teknoman117 wrote:
       | Ah, yes, amateur astronomy on Mars. Something we'll not be able
       | to do in my lifetime sadly.
        
         | njanirudh wrote:
         | I am expecting light pollution to follow us there also
        
           | formerly_proven wrote:
           | As I understand it, habitats would need to be under some
           | ground, and there really isn't much to do outside. So what'd
           | be the point of lighting the surface up?
        
       | hbcondo714 wrote:
       | > You would see two moons in that sky instead of one
       | 
       | Any pictures of this?
        
         | Medox wrote:
         | There are some videos (from pictures) of eclipses, which show
         | both: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M_Kn3M2ierk
         | 
         | This one more zoomed out, but only with Phobos:
         | https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ViiriVhIhjE
         | 
         | Taking into account that the Sun itself is seen smaller than on
         | Earth, we can already imagine the view. The main problem would
         | be that "Phobos is one of the least reflective bodies in the
         | Solar System, with an albedo of just 0.071.".
        
           | nostromo wrote:
           | This makes me appreciate our moon.
           | 
           | How lucky we are to have a moon that is roughly the same size
           | in the sky as the sun is -- aligned such that we occasionally
           | get to see a perfect solar eclipse and the sun's corona with
           | our naked eyes.
        
             | amelius wrote:
             | Also, it's more spherical than the moons of Mars.
        
             | giantrobot wrote:
             | > aligned such that we occasionally get to see a perfect
             | solar eclipse and the sun's corona with our naked eyes.
             | 
             | Uh...don't do that. It'll end up being the _last_ thing you
             | see.
        
       | tandr wrote:
       | > Night-time temperatures can drop to -900C
       | 
       | wait, what?
        
         | crazydoggers wrote:
         | That would be something... especially given that absolute zero,
         | the lowest temperature possible when matter ceases movement is
         | -273C.
         | 
         | It's a funny typo. Always makes you wonder how much other stuff
         | they get wrong that's missed.
        
         | teilo wrote:
         | I believe that's supposed to be -90C. Clearly a typo.
        
         | noja wrote:
         | You'd expect better from Sky At Night.
         | 
         | (Wikipedia says -143 degC, -225 degF)
        
           | midasuni wrote:
           | The attack on spacex at the start - the one company that's
           | actually likely to put sky at night readers on Mars - took me
           | out of it before the 900C hilarity.
        
             | onethought wrote:
             | The star link complaint seems kind of like how people must
             | have been when telegram/power lines went up.
        
       | tppiotrowski wrote:
       | Such great highlights from Curiosity, Spirit and Opportunity
       | woven into an enjoyable narrative. I had missed the noctilucent
       | clouds and transit of Phobos. Now stoked for Perseverance on Feb
       | 18th.
        
       | Medox wrote:
       | I remember Starry Night having the option to see the night sky
       | from different planets. You know, in case you wanted to track the
       | stars with a telescope, on Mars.
        
         | headcanon wrote:
         | I can't say enough good things about Starry Night in terms of
         | teaching me about Astronomy and the Universe early on. Being
         | able to "go" to other star systems and see what the night sky
         | looks like was essential for intuiting our "place" in the sky
         | in a lot of ways, much like playing Kerbal solidified my
         | intuition around basic orbital mechanics.
        
       | slingnow wrote:
       | The answer should be: nearly exactly the same, with the exception
       | of being able to see Earth and not being able to see Mars.
        
       | zabzonk wrote:
       | "And I came to the land where the sun is a tarnished penny, where
       | the wind is a whip, where two moons play at hot rod games"
       | 
       | Roger Zelazny, A Rose For Ecclesiastes
        
       | temp667 wrote:
       | Is this serious - crawling with starlink sats? At night I'm
       | really not noticing starlink sats even on earth. What I'm
       | noticing is MASSSIVE light pollution.
       | 
       | For an article about looking up with the human eye at the stars,
       | the hit on starlink sats is so weird.
       | 
       | Starlink is probably going to be what makes internet initially
       | possible on marks, may even be part of the mars - earth backhaul
       | network, probably spacex will be helping host space based
       | observation platforms (no dust / no atmo). etc.
        
       | Thaxll wrote:
       | I really wish we will be able to see some interesting Mars things
       | in our lifetime...
        
         | andi999 wrote:
         | Blue skies on Mars..
        
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       (page generated 2021-01-26 23:00 UTC)