Starsurfing | Venus





	Venus is ironically named after the Roman goddess of love. The surface of the planet isn't too lovely with acid rain, sulphuric acid clouds and skin blistering temperatures of 860 degrees Farenheit, which makes Venus the hottest planet in the Solar System even though it is the second closest planet to the Sun. The high temperature is caused by global warming that has gone out of control. Thick clouds of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere absorb the Sun's heat and it can't escape into outer space and is effectively trapped by the planet.

Planet Venus imaged in radar by the Magellan space probe.			Name: Venus Distance from Sun: 67,237,910 miles Diameter: 7521 miles Length of Day: 243 days Length of Year: 224.7 days Number of moons: 0
Image copyright NASA/JPL

Looking at the fast facts, you can see that the day is longer than the year. This isn't a mistake and the day is bizarrely longer than the year because the rotation of Venus is slower than its orbit. It also rotates backwards and this is known as retrograde motion.


		The surface of Venus is covered in many volcanoes, high plains, craters, mountains and valleys. Venus also has odd weird structures that aren't found anywhere else. These include surface fractures that resemble spider webs and they are aptly called arachnoids. All these features were created by volcanic eruptions and deposition of lava. The two images on this page were both created from radar data that was obtained from the probe called Mariner. The surface of Venus is completely obscured by the cloud layer so radar imaging is the only method that can reveal the planet's surface.
Maat Mons, a volcano on Venus.
Image copyright NASA/JPL


All the features on Venus are named after either real life or mythological women with a few exceptions. The north continent is named Ishtar Terra after the Babylonian goddess of love and the south continent is called Aphrodite Terra after the Greek goddess of love.