87 Otherworldly Facts About Planets & Moons in Space

The asteroid impact that killed the dinosaurs was powerful enough to send Earth rocks to Mars and even Europa. As a result, if we ever find life on those worlds it may actually have originated on our own planet.

52. In 1997, 3 men from Yemen tried to sue NASA for invading Mars, claiming they had inherited it from their ancestors 3,000 years ago.

53. One of Mars's moons, Phobos, appears to rise in the west and set in the east twice each Martian day (because it orbits Mars faster than Mars rotates) and it will eventually either collide with the planet or break apart to form planetary rings.

54. Scientists believe that if all of the ice on the polar caps of Mars were to be melted, it would cover the entire planet with water to a height of 30 meters,

55. Researchers are practicing for a human mission to Mars by living in the heart of Antarctica to see the effects of extreme isolation.

The Mars Rover "Spirit" has several times been hit by dust devils on the surface of Mars. Each time it is left unharmed and its solar panels are actually cleaned by the storm and this event is known as the "Cleaning Event".

57. Mars' smallest moon, Deimos, has an escape velocity of 5.2M/S, meaning that if you took a running jump while on it, you will launch off like a slow rocket.

58. The Mars One project is seeking to colonize Mars by 2023. The astronaut/colonists will spend the rest of their lives on the red planet.

59. Meteorites that fell to Earth in Morocco during a meteor shower in July of 2011 have been confirmed to be from Mars. It was likely ejected off the surface of the planet during an ancient asteroid impact.

60. There is a giant smiley-face shaped crater on Mars.

The Mars Opportunity rover, whose mission was planned to go for approximately 91 days, is still traveling across the Red Planet, having surpassed its duration of activity by 9 years and 94 days.

62. There is a large hole 150 meters across on Mars, who bottom has not yet been seen.

63. Enceladus, Saturn's 6th moon, has a warm ocean at its southern pole with ongoing hydrothermal activity the first ever discovered outside of Earth. This is the most life-friendly habitat ever discovered outside of Earth.

64. Saturn's moon Titan has such a dense atmosphere(1.5Atm) and such a low gravity (0.138G) that if you strapped wings to your hands you could easily fly.

65. In 1994, a hardly used public airstrip in Wyoming was designated by the city council as Greater Green River Intergalactic Spaceport for possible refugees from Jupiter

Scientists believe there is the 9th planet in our solar system that is roughly 10 times larger than earth. They haven't been able to locate it yet but they know it's there because of its gravitational effects on other objects.

67. Io, Jupiter's nearest orbiting "Galilean" moon is the most geologically active object in the Solar System.

68. Jupiter's moon Europa has more water than Earth’s surface oceans. Its subsurface ocean plus ice layer could range from 80 to 170 kilometers in average depth.

69. Every time Io passes into Jupiter's shadow, Io's atmosphere freezes solid and smashes into the surface. When Io moves back into the sunlight, the frozen atmosphere thaws and returns to a gas.

70. Saturn has a moon called Mimas and it has a crater in it that makes it look like the Death Star

Other planets such as Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, and Neptune have auroras with different colors.

72. When our solar system was forming, Jupiter gained enough mass that its self-gravity became strong enough to pull in a lot of interstellar gas, but not enough to start fusion. If this had happened our solar system would have been a binary star system (two suns) and for this reason, Jupiter is sometimes referred to as a “failed star.”

73. The Galileo space probe was intentionally crashed into Jupiter at the end of its operational life to avoid contaminating Jupiter's moons with bacteria.

74. UY Scuti is one of the leading candidates for being the largest known star by radius and is also one of the most luminous of its kind. It has volume 5 billion times that of the Sun. If placed at the center of our Solar System, it would engulf the orbit of Jupiter, although the radius is not known for certain and may be larger than the orbit of Saturn.

75. The Jesuit Order is credited as the single most important contributor to experimental physics in the 17th and 18th Centuries, with significant contributions to the study of magnetism, optics, and electricity; observed the colored bands of Jupiter, the Andromeda nebula, and Saturn’s rings.