The Most Beautiful Hellish Planet in the Solar System You may have seen it in the morning twilight: a dazzling white beacon visible in the sky right up to and even a bit past sunrise.
At first glance, it looks like a very bright star, but its not a star at all: its the planet Venus. Though lovely to behold, Venus is a world best appreciated from a great distance.
Its surface temperature is on the order of 900 degrees F, hot enough to melt lead, and it has a surface pressure of some 90 atmospheres. Moreover, its clouds produce a sulfuric acid rain corrosive enough to dissolve metal.
The Venus landers sent by the former Soviet Union in the 1970s lasted about an hour before the planets intense heat and atmospheric pressure destroyed them. Their pictures show a surface consisting of rolling plains covered in flat, broken rock beneath an orange sky.
Other spacecraft, most recently the Magellan orbiter, revealed that Venus is covered with volcanoes, some of which may still be active. The largest is over 430 miles (700 km) across.
Venus is the third-brightest celestial object visible from Earth. Only the moon and sun are brighter.
Late last month, Venus was at its greatest visual brightness for the year. In the language of astronomers, it reached a magnitude of -4.8. (The lower the magnitude value, the brighter the object. Many of the brightest stars we can see range between magnitudes -1 and 1.)
At its brightest, Venus can cast shadows on Earth. And if you know where to look, it is even bright enough to be seen in full daylight.
When Venus shines brightly in the evening or morning sky, people often mistake it for an incoming passenger jet with its landing lights on. Its brightness makes it appear much closer than it really is. In fact, it is not unusual for people to think Venus is following them, particularly when they are driving. Consequently, UFO reports increase when Venus is at its brightest.
The planets dazzling appearance is the result of two circumstances. First, the clouds that totally enshroud the planet reflect light very effectively. Second, Venus is often closer to Earth than any other planet, as close as 26 million miles (42 million km). The next brightest planet, Jupiter, is also cloud-covered, and this gas giant is 11 times the size of Venus but it is also 15 times farther away.
Venus brightness varies depending on its position relative to the sun and Earth. Because Venus orbit lies inside Earths, it appears wander from one side of the sun to the other and back again.
When Venus is east of the sun in our sky, we see it after sunset; when it is west of the Sun, as it is now, we see it in the pre-dawn sky. Right now, the angle Venus makes with the sun and Earth is almost exactly 90 degrees, and we see the planet as a half-circle.
By the end of the year, more of the planet will be illuminated, but it will also be tens of millions of miles further away and therefore less bright.
Though it begins slowly fading this month, Venus should remain a brilliant morning object throughout the remainder of the year.
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