How close is jupiter to mars?

Answer 1

In 1968 Ragni and Rado's hippy musical Hair featured the following lyrics:

"When the Moon is in the Seventh House
And Jupiter aligns with Mars
Then peace will guide the planets
And love will steer the stars

This is the dawning of the Age of Aquarius
The Age of Aquarius
Aquarius!
Aquarius!"

As is implied by these lyrics, Jupiter and Mars aren't always aligned. They move into alignment and out of it again, Their years are of different lengths (Mars 1.88 Earth years and Jupiter 11.86 Earth years)

For a simple picture (ignoring the fact the orbits are ellipses), the radius of Jupiter's orbit is 5 AU and the radius of Mars' orbit is 1,5 AU.

Their mutual separation can vary widely e.g. when they are both on the same side of the sun, ir can be as little as 3.5 AU, when they are 180 degrees away from one another in their orbits, with the Sun inbetween them, it is more like 6.5 AU.

But the fact that the orbits are not circular but elliptical will make it more complicated as the question of whether the planets are at aphelion (the furthest they get from the Sun) or at perihelion (the nearest they get to the Sun) becomes highly relevant.

If Mars is at aphelion when Jupiter is at perihelion that will produce the minimum Mars-Jupiter seoparation at alignment and conversely if Mars were to be at perihelion and Jupiter at aphelion, that will produce the maximum Mars-Jupiter separation at alignment,

Here are the figures;

Jupiter: Perihelion: 4.951 AU. Aphelion: 5.455 AU.
Mars: Perihelion: 1.381 AU. Aphelion: 1.665 AU

Which gives us a minimum Mars-Jupiter distance at alignment of 4.951 - 1,665 AU = 3.286 AU.

And gives us a maximum Mars-Jupiter distance at alignment of 5.455 - 1,381 AU = 4.074 AU.

When they are 180 degrees away from one another with the Sun directly between them ... it is a matter of adding the perihelion distances for the closest they can be and adding the aphelion distances for the furthest they can get from one another.

Which gives us a minimum Mars-Jupiter distance when 180 degrees apart of 4.951 + 1,381 AU = 6.332 AU.

And gives us a maximum Mars-Jupiter distance when 180 degrees apart of 5.455 + 1,665 AU = 7.120 AU.

Answer 2

Distance between Jupiter and Mars is
484,779,121 Miles

Answer 3

They are both moving around the sun, like we are. So sometimes they're closer to each other and sometimes very far away from each other.

Information about each planet is available on Wikipedia, the free, online encyclopedia:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mars
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jupiter

The current position of the planets is available in the "Ephemeris" (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ephemeris) which is kept by the Jet Propulsion Laboratory. Their web page on planet positions is:
http://ssd.jpl.nasa.gov/?orbits

Hope this helps!

Answer 4

Real Answer here
550 400 000 Kms

Answer 5

Not so close, definitely can't jump from one to another

Answer 6

About 483,779,858 miles.

No joke.

Answer 7

not so much