By Sana Lamba

SPACE….THE MOST MYSTERIOUS PLACE

We live in a solar system called the Milky Way.

There are 9 planets including a dwarf planet, Pluto.

These 9 planets revolve around the Sun, a hot ball of burning gas.

MECURY

Mercury is the fastest planet.

Mercury zooms around the sun in just 88 days at an incredible 173,000 kph.

That makes it faster than any space rocket invented!

Mercury is the planet closest to the sun but it’s neighbour Venus is hotter because it has clouds to keep in the heat.

VENUS

Venus is named after a goddess. Venus was the name of the Roman goddess of Love and Beauty, just right for the planet which many people think is the most beautiful object in the sky.

It also has a erupting volcano.

Venus is sometimes called the Evening Star because it is so bright, it is one of the first point of light we see shining as it gets dark.

EARTH

When earth first formed it was extremely hot and there was no oxygen. Over millions of years, the planet cooled, oceans formed and oxygen was made.

The center of the Earth is made of a molten metal called iron, which make it like a giant magnet.

The Earth looks beautiful from space –blue with swirling white clouds.

MARSMars was named after the roman god of war, because of it’s blood- red colour, which comes from iron- rich soil and rock.

Mars has ice at its pole which is actually frozen carbon dioxide gas. At the North Pole, there may be frozen water, mixed with the frozen carbon dioxide. There maybe frozen water underground too.

Mars has 2 tiny moons, Deimos and Phobos, are not round like our moon. They look more like baked potatoes! They might have been asteroids that Mars captured with its gravity.

JUPITERJupiter is so big that all the other planets in the solar system could fit in to it! If it was any bigger, it might become too hot in the middle and turn into another sun.

Jupiter is stripy – the planet looks like it is wearing a giant pair of pyjamas because of its bands of clouds. They are made of forzen crystals of water, ammonia and other chemicals.

Violent winds whip up storms all over Jupiter but the big red spot is the largest. It has been raging for over 300 years.

SATURN

Saturn’s rings aren’t solid, but are made up of millions of chunks of ice and rock.

You could fit about 740 Earths into Saturn! It is the solar system’s 2nd largest planet.

Saturn is made up of liquid and gas with a small rocky centre. It is so light that if there was an ocean big enough, the planet would float on it like a boat.

URANUS

Uranus was discovered William Herschel. He was going to call it George after the English King at the time but then named if after the Greek god of the Sky.

Uranus has 17 moons!

Uranus is blue because it is largely made of a stinky gas called methane.

The poles on Uranus are warmer than the equator. Uranus is tilted on its side. Summer on the south pole lasts 42 years.

NEPTUNE

On Neptune, it is very very windy! Winds rip across the planet all the time, much faster than any winds on Earth. There are also a lot fo storms on Neptune which show up as dark spots.

Triton and Nereid are main moons of Neptune but it also has 7 other moons. Triton is one of the coldest ever recorded : -226 degrees C!

When the gas nitrogen freezes on Neptune, it looks like pink snow!

PLUTO

Pluto is the coldest planet of all which is obvious because it is farthest from the sun.

Pluto is named after the Greek god of the Underworld.

Pluto is smaller than a country! You could fit it in to the USA or Russia. That is why it is a called a dwarf planet.

THANK YOU!