Saturn is the sixth planet from the Sun and the second largest planet in the Solar System. Saturn is a gas giant planet like Jupiter and has no solid surface. It is mainly composed of hydrogen and helium gases. Saturn is the only planet in our solar system whose average density is less than that of water. This means that if you get a bathtub big enough, the Saturn can float.
You probably know Saturn for its dramatic and beautiful rings. Saturn is not the only planet with rings, but they are the largest and brightest. You may be surprised to learn that rings are not solid. They are made of millions of pieces of ice and rock! These fragments form a system of 7 rings orbiting Saturn.
Each ring revolves around Saturn at different speeds. The rings contain fragments of ice and rock ranging in size from a few centimeters to several meters. Although the rings look impressive, they are only about 1 km thick. But they are very wide – 250,000 km in diameter.
Saturn is covered with layers of clouds that are streaked with yellow, brown and white. Winds in the clouds can reach speeds of up to 500 meters per second. This is faster than the winds blowing in the strongest hurricanes on Earth. Cold winds at Saturn's north pole create a remarkable hexagonal shape in the clouds.
Saturn rotates on its axis like the Earth, so there are days and nights on it. It is the second shortest day among the 8 planets. A day on Saturn is about 10 and a half hours! Much less than Earth's 24 hours. Saturn's axis is tilted about 27 degrees.
Apart from the rings, Saturn also has dozens of moons. Saturn's largest moon, Titan, is larger than Mercury and the dwarf planet Pluto. Titan is so big that it has its own atmosphere. Scientists believe that Titan and Saturn's second moon (Enceladus) have oceans beneath the surface. This means that they can get the right conditions for life.
The first spacecraft to visit Saturn was Pioneer 11 in 1979. Many other spacecraft have also visited Saturn since then. The Cassini–Huygens spacecraft spent 13 years studying Saturn and orbited it 294 times...
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Image taken from Pixabay...
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