Astronomers and amateurs started eyeing Mars Wednesday hoping for a good look at the Red Planet as it moves closer to Earth than at any time since Stone Age Neanderthals roamed the world.

Cloudy weather in parts of the Asia-Pacific zone, where night falls first, prevented many from witnessing the spectacle but did not deter turnout -- there or in other parts of the globe -- by tens of thousands hoping for a glimpse of the red-organge globe.

"Mars has not lost its charm... It is truly a planet that makes men dream," Italian astrophysicist Margherita Hack, Italy's foremost star-gazer based in Trieste, told Corriere della Sera.

As of August 27, the Red Planet will be a galactically trifling 55.76 million kilometres (34.65 million miles) from Earth, according to Belgian astronomer Jean Meeus, who calculated the two planets last came as close nearly 60,000 years ago.

Earth's rare rendezvous, next forecast for 2287, with the fourth planet from the Sun has triggered a run on telescope sales and speculation ranging from serious to silly.

"People's interest in Mars is reaching a peak as some people are increasingly speculating on the existence of life" on Earth's neighbor planet, said astronomer Noritaka Tokimasa at Nishi-Harima Observatory in Hyogo in western Japan.

It was one of 300 observatories across Japan -- along with hundreds more around the globe -- where thousands of astronomy buffs fled urban glare to take part in "Mars Observation" shows.

In Germany, the number of "UFO sightings" soared, fed by pervasive fantasies that Mars -- with its craters, valleys and volcanoes not unlike those on Earth -- hosts extraterrestrial life.

Werner Walter at Germany's CENAP center that follows unidentified flying object reports said he was "hearing the most outrageous claims", one from a retired couple who said they were followed for two hours by an orange UFO.

Mars' fiery color might easily fool the uninformed "into believing they are witnessing the arrival of a UFO," he said.

In Hungary the Urania planetarium in Budapest is the place to be for Mars watchers. Tuesday, people hoping to catch a glimpse of the red planet waited in line for more than one hour, Imre Kurti of Urania told AFP.

Big crowds also queued at the Museum of the Cosmos in Tenerife, in Spain's Canary Islands, one of the largest European observatories.

And telescope sales meanwhile surged 20 percent in the past few days in Austria, industry officials there said.

Named for the Roman god of war, Mars' proximity had soothsayers, notably in Asia, warning it will bring war, terrorism and disaster.

It will cast a spell of misfortune until September 20, Indian astrologer R.L. Kanthan told the Times of India, stating two deadly car bombs in Bombay that killed 52 this week were the work of Mars, not Islamic militants.

"It will also increase the chances of war, terrorism and accidents," Thailand's leading astrologer Pinyo Pongcharoen told Bangkok's Daily News.

Hong Kong's Feng Shui master and astrologer Chung King-kwong warned "there will be more natural disasters", pointing to the freak heat wave that left thousands dead in Europe this month.

Portuguese astrologer Rui Lorga put a different spin on events.

"Men will be sexually more active," he told the A Capital paper. "But obviously women will also feel the influence of Mars, however in a more subtle way."

Lisbon's Observatory of Astronomy meanwhile said it had had worried calls from people who feared the two planets might crash.

"It's the chance that it might harbor life that captures people's imagination," said Ed Krupp, director of Griffith Observatory in Los Angeles.

The notion was inadvertently fostered in 1877 when an Italian astronomer's description of dark lines on mars was mistranslated into "canals" implying a man-made feature that holds water, the source of life.

But, Mosley said, Mars' cold temperatures and lack of atmosphere make "it is impossible, even for bacteria to survive."

Foremost in the minds of scientists watching Mars Wednesday is the hope of finding water on the Red Planet -- the critical ingredient for dreams of making Mars mankind's first colony in space.

No fewer than four new probes -- two US, one European and one Japanese -- are now hurtling towards Mars to try answer the question. The frontrunner, by Europe's Mars Express orbiter and its Beagle-2 lander built in Leicester, England, is scheduled for December 25.

SPACE.WIRE