Tuesday, May 8, 2012

There's Something About Mercury

We aren't all as infatuated with Mercury as Mary's lovers were, but it's still a pretty neat planet. This is the first of the planets in our Solar System. It is pretty small, and many find it uninteresting. But for me it will always be my first love, the one that got away. It was my favorite planet in elementary school. I can still picture the postcard I made about it. Yeah, Saturn has pretty rings, and Jupiter has that huge storm going on, but Mercury, Mercury has one side perpetually facing the Sun for three months straight! The extreme in temperatures it causes was so fascinating to me. I decided that anyone who wanted to take a vacation in space to get a sun tan, then Mercury would be the place to go.


I decided to replicate this wonderful postcard:

Like I mentioned before, Mercury has a different kind of orbit. At first, it was theorized that it was comparable to the way the moon orbits Earth. It's different in that one side of Mercury faces the Sun for three months at a time. So it's the perfect length for a summer vaycay!

The surface or Mercury doesn't seem different from the Moon's.
It's what lies beneath that matters.

Mercury, although plain looking, is no ordinary planet. It may look like the moon, but it's quite different. For one, it has a magnetic field. That is a pretty big deal. The moon, Mars, and Venus don't have magnetic fields. This makes Mercury an option for colonization. Having a magnetic field protects the plantet from deadly solar radiation. Of course we'd have to stay away from the areas with extreme temps. And let's not forget about not having one of those atmospheres. 

Although Mercury is the smallest planet, it has a big place in my heart. Hopefully this blog will help people realize that there is indeed Something About Mercury.

Sources:
Image 1: My childhood memories
Image 2: http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/spaceimages/details.php?id=PIA02443
Image 3: http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/spaceimages/details.php?id=PIA03101
Textbook: Astronomy Today; Chaisson, McMillan
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Colonization_of_Mercury



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4 comments:

  1. UnknownMay 9, 2012 at 1:07 PM

    I'd like to build a summer home in a crater near the north pole of Mercury. This way I will always have the option of sunlight or shade.

    ReplyDelete
  2. The Morris storyMay 9, 2012 at 1:34 PM

    That would be quite ideal. You could go tanning one day and then ice skating in one of the craters the next!

    ReplyDelete
  3. EleanorMay 9, 2012 at 4:51 PM

    Curse our pesky need for oxygen. Atmospheres really are useful with that kind of thing... I am pretty excited that you have another blog. I was obsessed with this stuff when I was a kid... I even had a notebook with anything vaguely astronomical I found.

    Nice to see I wasn't alone.

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    Replies
    1. The Morris storyMay 10, 2012 at 11:07 AM

      I love doing this blog. I posted it close to midnight because I had lost track of the time. Doing the research for it is so fun.

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