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Mars

Adapted from Wikipedia · Explorer experience

A stunning view of Mars showing the vast Valles Marineris canyon and surrounding landscapes, captured by the Viking 1 Orbiter in 1980.

A Trip to Mars

Mars is our neighbor planet, just next door to the Sun! It is the fourth planet from the Sun, right after Earth. People call Mars the "Red Planet" because it glows with a beautiful orange-red color in the night sky.

Mars is a rocky planet with a very thin air made mostly of carbon dioxide. The temperatures there can be super cold, ranging from -153 to 20 degrees Celsius. Even though it looks dry, Mars has hidden water in its soil, as frost, and in big ice caps at its poles.

Mars has some amazing features! It has huge volcanoes, and the tallest one is Olympus Mons, which is bigger than any mountain on Earth. It also has a giant canyon called Valles Marineris, even longer and deeper than the Grand Canyon!

Mars travels around the Sun in an oval path and takes about 687 Earth days to complete one trip. It has two small moons named Phobos and Deimos. These moons were discovered by a scientist named Asaph Hall in 1877.

People have been watching Mars for thousands of years. Ancient groups like the Sumerians and Egyptian astronomers saw it moving in the night sky and named it after gods. Today, many spacecraft visit Mars, sending us pictures and information. Scientists are excited to learn more about Mars and its history. Maybe one day, humans will visit this amazing planet too!

Images

Tracks left by dust devils on the surface of Mars, created by spinning wind vortices.
A giant dust devil on Mars casting a long, snake-like shadow across the red planet's surface, photographed by a NASA camera orbiting the planet.
A diagram comparing the sizes of planets and other celestial objects in our solar system, from Mercury to Ceres.
A colorful map showing the height and shape of the surface on Mars, the red planet!
A colorful map showing the surface features of the planet Mars, created by NASA using computer software.
A detailed image of Olympus Mons, the tallest volcano in our solar system, located on the planet Mars. Captured by the European Space Agency's Mars Express mission.
A photograph of Mars showing dark dune spots on its surface, taken by the Mars Global Surveyor spacecraft.
Two views of the planet Mars: one without a dust storm and one with a large dust storm swirling across its surface.
A colorful view of Cassini Crater on Mars, captured by the Hope Mission's EXI camera from space.
Artist's concept of sand jets (geysers) shooting into the sky on Mars.

This article is a child-friendly adaptation of the Wikipedia article on Mars, available under CC BY-SA 4.0.

Images from Wikimedia Commons. Tap any image to view credits and license.