Remembering Mars by André Montambault
Remembering Mars (André Montambault)

Remembering Mars by André Montambault

A view of the red planet from 215 kilometres is our Photo of the Week.

Photo of the Week for December 2, 2016

While still a conspicuous sight in the evening sky, telescopically Mars is a far cry from its showing last spring. When it reached opposition on May 22, the planet was 76 million km away and displayed a –2.1-magnitude disc spanning 18.6 arc seconds. Now, as it drifts eastward through the zodiacal constellation Capricornus, it appears as a 0.6-magnitude dot only 6.5 arc seconds across. Little wonder the red planet is so diminished—it now lies at a distance of nearly 215 million kilometres.

Remembering Mars by André Montambault
Remembering Mars (André Montambault)

This Mars portrait by Drummondville, Quebec, imager André Montambault, captured the planet as it appeared on June 4, 2016. He used a Celestron C11 Schmidt-Cassegrain telescope equipped with a 2× Barlow lens and a ZWO ASI120MM monochrome CCD camera to record AVI data through infrared, green, and blue filters.