What is Mars Like?
Mars is about half the size of Earth. Only Mercury is smaller. Because Mars is smaller than Earth, its gravity is also less. If you weighed 70 pounds on Earth, you’d weigh about 27 pounds on Mars.
Mars’ surface looks like a red desert. There are mountains, canyons, and craters. There are no rivers or oceans. It is a dry planet without any liquid water. The average temperature is -65 °C. It does have ice caps at the north and south poles. Mars has tall mountains and deep canyons. The soil is full of rust-coloured iron dust. This makes Mars look red. It was named by the ancient Romans for their god of war. It is very cold on Mars. Mars has very little atmosphere. Its atmosphere is only about 1% as dense as Earth’s. There is enough atmosphere to cause clouds and winds. Strong winds blow and cause big dust storms.
Evidence suggests that Mars once had rivers, streams, lakes, and maybe even an ocean. There are gullies and canyons on Mars. Scientists believe that there once was water on the surface of Mars that created these gullies. Today the only water on Mars is either frozen in the polar caps or underground.
Mars has mountains that are much higher than the mountains on Earth. Olympus Mons, the biggest volcano in the whole solar system. Mars’ volcanoes are not erupting today, but they were active long ago. Mars also has bigger, deeper canyons than Earth’s. Mars’ surface is pitted with craters like the craters on Earth’s moon.
1 orbit of Sun (year): 687 Earth-days long
1 rotation (day): 24.5 hours
Average distance from Sun: 229 million km
Diameter: 6794 km
Average Temperature: -65 °C
Atmosphere: is thin. Pink, blue, and white clouds move through the sky
Surface: covered with reddish rocks, canyons, and enormous volcanic mountains
Natural satallites (moons): 2
Ring System: no
It is very cold on Mars. The temperature is -65′c and it has 2 moons and it has no ring
system how long a day is 24,5 hours.