Mock Mars Mission: Stunning Night Sky Shines Over Utah Outpost

[Buster's Uncle]

Mock Mars Mission: Stunning Night Sky Shines Over Utah Outpost
SPACE.com
by Elizabeth Howell, SPACE.com Contributor  1 hour ago



Space journalist Elizabeth Howell using the 14-inch telescope in the observatory at the Mars Desert Research Station



Editor's Note: In the Utah desert, scientists are attempting to recreate what a real-life mission to Mars might be like, and SPACE.com contributor Elizabeth Howell is along for the ride. Here's her latest dispatch.

HANKSVILLE, Utah — In the desert here, the nearly full moon was so bright that we didn't even need a flashlight to walk to the Mars Desert Research Station Musk Observatory. The stars were still, as the dry air did not provide much humidity to cause twinkling.

About 100 feet away from our Habitat, two crew members had captured (the Andromeda Galaxy M31) in the telescope at the Mars Society observatory, which is a tiny room just barely big enough to fit a crew of five or six. They eagerly gestured me, and a few others, to take a look. Even in the light of the moon, you could still see the smudge of the galaxy located some 2 million light-years from Earth.



The bands of Jupiter are easily visible through the 14-inch telescope at the Mars Desert Research Station


In turn, we each requested targets. The Pleiades. The moon. Jupiter. The Celestron 14-inch CGE1400 telescope is programmable, requiring one only to scroll through a menu for these major targets. Crew astronomer Pedro Diaz-Rubin talked about his plans to watch the occultations of Jupiter's moons in future days.

While the telescope is just of a moderate size, the conditions around MDRS are perfect for observing. The nearest town (Hanksville) is small and about 8 miles (13 kilometers) away, meaning we have no light pollution to contend with.



The observatory (right) is situated about 100 feet (30 meters) from the Mars Desert Research Station


I'm not a serious astronomer in any sense, but to see stars steadily shining at the horizon, and a full Milky Way on nights when the moon is not shining, is far different from what I'm used to in my hometown of Ottawa.

Crew 133 engineer Joseph Jessup also set up a radio telescope just outside of the observatory last week, which has provided us with great views of activity around Jupiter's system. I've been told the telescope has been picking up flares on Io, Jupiter's large volcanic moon.


http://news.yahoo.com/mock-mars-mission-stunning-night-sky-shines-over-153929212.html

[Geo]

Weird, no moons to be seen on that picture of Jupiter.

[Buster's Uncle]

They'd be out of frame, I think.

[Geo]

Io and likely Europa should be within frame.

[Buster's Uncle]

How far out are their orbits?

[Geo]

See for yourself.

So Io should for sure be visible, unless its behind Jupiter. And given that most of the time Europa's orbit isn't (as seen from our point of view) on the furthest reaches, 't should be visible as well.
I can believe one of those moons behind the planet, but both? Most of the time when looking at Jupiter, two-three moons are visible.

[Buster's Uncle]

I don't see anything about orbital radius in that table.  I believe Jupiter has a diameter of approx. 23,000 miles, and that the orbital plane is diagonal in the shot, given the orientation of the bands, and I'd eyeball estimate that some thing further out than  100,000 miles wouldn't necessarily be in frame.  Roche limits being what they are, I bet bodies a large as those moons wouldn't be much closer in than that and remain intact.

It is odd that none of them are in the frame, even so.  I think at that resolution, they'd appear as spheres, too.

[Geo]

I don't see anything about orbital radius in that table.  I believe Jupiter has a diameter of approx. 23,000 miles, and that the orbital plane is diagonal in the shot, given the orientation of the bands, and I'd eyeball estimate that some thing further out than  100,000 miles wouldn't necessarily be in frame.  Roche limits being what they are, I bet bodies a large as those moons wouldn't be much closer in than that and remain intact.

It's about 143000 km across. Say 90,000 miles.

[Geo]

To add, under the link you can find pictures taken by Earth observers around last opposition (January 5th). I didn't realize even Callisto, 1,88 million kms out, can still cast a shadow over Jupiters' clouds.