Showing posts with label Uranus. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Uranus. Show all posts

Saturday, October 11, 2014

Uranus - Voyager 2


We've learned about space exploration of Mercury, Venus, Mars, Jupiter and Saturn.

Next up is Uranus.

It is so far away that only one spacecraft has ever come close to it: Voyager 2.
On September 5, 1977 the Voyager spacecraft was launched into space.
Voyager 2 took 2 years to get to Jupiter, 4 years to get to Saturn, and then 9 years to get to Uranus!

When Voyager 2 made it to Uranus, it found 10 moons that we didn't know existed, studied the air and space around it, found two new rings around the planet, and took pictures of the moons and Uranus.


(from: wikipedia - voyager 2)


Kid Facts - Blast from the past: Star System

Saturday, March 9, 2013

Uranus


We just learned a little about Saturn.

Uranus is the third biggest planet in the solar system and almost the furthest from the sun.
It is over 14 times bigger than Earth
uranus
(from: wikipedia - uranus)

The most interesting thing about Uranus is the way it rotates or spins.
The way Earth and the other planets spin around, you can think of them like spinning tops orbiting the sun.

But Uranus doesn't spin like a top, it acts more like a ball rolling on the ground.
The orbit is completely sideways!

This means that for half of it's year, it's South Pole is facing the sun,
and for the other half, it's North Pole is facing the sun.

Since a year on Uranus is 84 Earth years long, that means it's sunny in the North Pole for 42 years!