Mars Fever strikes again!

There is a 2003-vintage Mars e-mail hoax making the rounds again. It claims that on August 27, THIS YEAR Mars will be so close to Earth that it will "look as large as the moon." Not so! If Mars were that close we would crash into it or be infected with "Mars Fever."

Edgar Rice Burroughs had Mars Fever for years when he wrote "A Princess of Mars," his first fantasy about the Red Planet. Then, he followed that with "John Carter of Mars" and "The Gods of Mars." It's a wonder he didn't arrange for Tarzan of the Apes to visit Mars and swim the canals with Jane and Boy.

Then, there was the early sci-fi novella "War of the Worlds," written by another Mars Fever sufferer, H.G. Wells, a tale that describes an invasion of England by aliens from Mars.

In 1938, Orson Welles, probably infected with Mars Fever, made "War of the Worlds" into a magnificent hoax for the radio drama anthology Mercury Theatre on the Air and aired it Halloween night. Did that ever start a ruckus!

The first half of the 60-minute broadcast was presented as a series of dramatic news bulletins, suggesting that a Martian invasion was actually in progress. There is still controversy about whether people actually panicked in the streets and a series of urban legends suggest that major disturbances took place.

I know for sure that it caused a "major disturbance" in my grandfather's home; I was there listening to the broadcast, and I thought it was for real. So did my grandfather. He started shouting to my uncles: "Get the shotguns out, boys, some foreigners from Mars are invading West Haven!"

It is true that on August 27, 2003, Earth did come to within 34.6 million miles of Mars. The last time the two planets were that close was about 60,000 years ago (when Ron and I were just snot-nosed kids). As a result, the 2003 fly-by was a great opportunity for astronomers using earth-bound telescopes to get a closer look at the Martian surface.

One tidbit of information that emerged from all the hoopla was the fact that, through a 75-power telescope, Mars appeared as large as the full moon looks to the naked eye. But somehow as the story was retold any reference to a telescope was dropped. Mars Fever again....

Earth and Mars do not approach each other every summer. The solar system geometry that brings the two planets close by is called "opposition." On average, there are 26 months from one opposition to the next.

But not all approaches are created equal. Because the orbit of Mars is highly out-of-round (elliptical), close encounters can range from 34.5 to 63.0 million miles. The next opposition will take place on Christmas Eve of this year, when Mars and the earth will be separated by a whopping 55 million miles.

Instead of Earth being invaded by Martians, we have been invading Mars off and on since 1976 when we successfully landed two instrumented probes, Viking I and Viking 2. In fact, mobile robots Spirit and Opportunity still roam the surface of Mars searching for any sign of life, past and present.

Whether fancied as the source of hostile invaders of Earth, the home of a dying civilization or a rough-and-tumble mining colony of the future, Mars will continue to provide fertile ground for sci-fi writers and goofy e-mails based on seeds planted by centuries of scientific observations - and Mars Fever.