Summer season solstice on Mars
Earth skilled its summer solstice for the Northern Hemisphere on June 21, 2023. That’s when Earth’s north pole tilted most towards the sun, giving the Northern Hemisphere the best quantity of daylight and marking the arrival of summer time. On the similar time, the Southern Hemisphere had its shortest days and entered winter.
Mars has solstices as nicely. Mars’ summer time solstice for the northern hemisphere arrives right now, July 12, 2023. The exact second is at 6:35 p.m. CDT (23:35 UTC).
The rotational axis and north and south poles of each Earth and Mars tilt in relation to their orbital planes. This tilt means typically a part of the planets have extra daylight than others, and it’s what provides the planets their seasons. Earth tilts 23.4 levels from its orbital airplane, and Mars tilts 25.2 levels.
As Guy Ottewell posted at his weblog, Universal Workshop:
Mars has its northern summer time solstice on July 12. That’s, its north pole leans most towards the sun, in order that its north polar icecap is shrunken however most in view.
Right here is the space view of Mars’ orbit from web page 115 of Astronomical Calendar 2023, vastly simplified by eradicating particulars apart from the tracks of Earth and Mars and the arrow indicating the axis of Mars’s rotation, so to see why, this July, the planet’s north pole is most tilted towards the sun.
The label for Virgo the Maiden appears to be like backward, as a result of Man imagines you’re on Earth within the diagram, trying outward to the constellation Virgo and studying the label from the opposite route.
Coming seasons on Mars
The Planetary Society has a chart of the dates of the upcoming seasons on Mars. Following this summer time solstice for the northern hemisphere, Mars may have an autumnal equinox on January 12, 2024. The northern hemisphere’s winter solstice is on June 7, 2024. The spring equinox shouldn’t be till November 12, 2024. After which the next summer time solstice will likely be Could 29, 2025. A 12 months on Mars is nearly so long as two years on Earth.
Backside line: The summer time solstice on Mars’ northern hemisphere happens at 23:35 UTC on July 12, 2023. At the moment, the north pole is pointed most immediately towards the sun.
Read more: Is there a North Star for Mars?
Read more: Mars in 2023: Fading dramatically in July
