10 Amazing Facts About The Planet Mars
Published by Some amazing facts about the planet Mars.
1. Mars is named after the Roman god of war because its red color reminded early observers of blood. The reason for the red color is that the soil is mostly composed of iron oxide, or what we commonly call rust.
2. Mars’ atmosphere is more than 95% CO2.
3. Mars has the largest volcano in the solar system, Olympus Mons. Olympus Mons is 15.5 miles (24.9 kilometers) high and 372 miles (598 kilometers) across.
4. Mars is about half the size of the earth and has about a third of earth’s gravity. So you could jump tree times higher on Mars!
5. Mars has dust storms and small tornadoes. In 2001, a huge dust storm was observed that covered the entire planet for several earth days. Mars has more dust storms when it’s closer to the Sun. When it’s on the far-side of its orbit there are icy clouds made of carbon dioxide and dust.
6. Mars’ moon Phobos orbits dangerously close. Being only 5,827 miles (9,377 kilometers) from the center of Mars Phobos is closer to its primary than any other known planetary moon. The moon will eventually either impact the surface of Mars or break up into a planetary ring.
7. “Canals” seen on the surface of Mars by early observers lead them to believe there were aliens inhabiting the planet. In fact, Mars is one of the least habitable planets, with freezing temperatures, solar winds, and almost no atmosphere.
8. Scientists believe these “canals” seen by early observers are evidence that Mars once had liquid water on its surface.
9. The Borealis basin (below), is a large basin in the northern hemisphere of Mars that covers 40% of the planet. It is thought to have been created by a large impact.
10. On July 31, 2008 the Phoenix lander directly sampled water ice in shallow Martian soil.
Sources Cited:
Most Interesting Facts About Mars
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Liked it
On October 26, 2010 at 12:47 am
Very good facts friend.
On October 26, 2010 at 12:47 am
Excellent article loaded with incredible information and photos.
On October 26, 2010 at 12:58 am
Interesting facts to know. Thanks for sharing.
pearl
On October 26, 2010 at 1:44 am
$ nice post$
On October 26, 2010 at 4:50 am
Good post. Thanks for sharing this one…
On October 26, 2010 at 4:51 am
nicely done!
this is a comprehensive reading material…
On October 26, 2010 at 8:12 am
mars is an interesting planet!
On October 26, 2010 at 10:01 am
Good choice of facts. Though, I knew them all as I used to be very interested in this kind of stuff (and still am to some degree).
On October 26, 2010 at 12:38 pm
Thank you friends
On October 27, 2010 at 12:21 pm
Very cool!
Blessings.
Sincerely,
-Joie Schmidt.
On October 27, 2010 at 12:54 pm
Indeed some amazing facts. Thanks for sharing this! It’s always nice to know more about everything and Planets are very interesting!
Best regards,
Blu
On October 27, 2010 at 3:20 pm
Amazing facts, well done. LB
On October 28, 2010 at 11:51 pm
Interesting post.Thank you for the great read!
On November 20, 2010 at 8:20 am
Some amazing facts shown here! I don’t kbnow a lot about planets so this was a great article for me thanks!