After months of anticipation, the day of Mars' closest approach has arrived. For those who need to know details, at 5:52 a.m. EDT we pass within 34,646,000 miles of the Red Planet. Mars also reaches its greatest brilliance, magnitude -2.9, and apparent size, 25.1 arc seconds in diameter. For comparison, Mars is now as bright as Jupiter ever gets. Jupiter can appear as large as 46 arc seconds, however. It will be the year 2287 before Mars comes closer than this (and then only by 43,000 miles).