Mars
Facts-
Mars is the second smallest planet in the solar system. Mars's day is 39 minutes and 35 seconds longer than Earth's day. Mars's year is about twice as long as Earth's year. The planet's surface area is about as large as Earth's land (not including water). People believe that Mars use to have running water the like lakes or streams because Mars appears to have dried up channels, but now people found that it is all frozen ice underground. Mars's gravity is about 2/5 as strong as Earth's gravity, which means it takes longer to fall down and you could jump several times higher. Although you would weigh less, if you tried to catch something very heavy it would knock you over and crush you. Mars was the god of war and agriculture in Roman mythology. Mars got its name because it is red like blood.
Mars's Surface and Atmosphere-
Mars's atmosphere is very thin, and its crust is mostly made of basalt. When Mars is closest to the sun, it stirs up dust storms. Some of the storms are large enough to cover the whole planet in a cloud of dust. Also some storms are so large they can be seen from Earth's telescopes. These dust storms can get to wind speeds of 200 km per hour and last hundreds of days. Mars has ice caps at its poles. These ice caps are made of frozen carbon dioxide instead of ice. Mars is home of the largest volcano in the solar system, Olympus Mons. Olympus Mons is 27 km tall (three times the height of Mount Everest) and 625 km across (takes up and an area as big as Arizona). There is an area on Mars with four volcanoes called Tharsis Bulge. Scientist think that when Tharsis Bulge was created when Mars's surface cracked and made Valles Marineris. Valles Marineris is a huge canyon on Mars about 4000 km long, up to 7 km deep , and up to 200 km wide. The crust has grown so thick that lava no longer reaches the surface, so there are no active volcanoes on Mars.
Sources-
http://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/Wikijunior:Solar_System/Mars
http://images.cdn.fotopedia.com/flickr-5587764654-hd.jpg
http://www.flickr.com/photos/cosmobc/4484688308/
http://images.cdn.fotopedia.com/flickr-5587764654-hd.jpg
http://www.flickr.com/photos/cosmobc/4484688308/