FIND IT TONIGHT · BANGKOK
Venus in numbers
- 0.95 × Earth
- Width
- 243 Earth days, backwards
- One day
- 225 days
- One year
- 0
- Known moons
- 465 °C
- Surface temperature, the hottest planet, even though Mercury is closer to the Sun.
- 90 ×
- The air pressure on Earth, like being about 900 m underwater.
- 243 days
- One spin. Its day is longer than its year.
WORTH KNOWING
The brightest planet in our sky is a greenhouse gone wrong.
Thick carbon dioxide air and clouds of sulfuric acid trap the Sun's heat. That is why Venus is hotter than Mercury.
From Earth it is dazzling: after the Moon, the brightest thing in the night sky. People often mistake it for a plane's landing light.
Who has been there
- 1970Venera 7First spacecraft to land on another planet and send data back.
- 1990–94MagellanMapped the surface through the clouds with radar.
- 2006–14Venus ExpressESA orbiter that studied the atmosphere.