It Really IS a Small World We’re Living in
Are you ready to be blown away by the mind-boggling scales involved in astronomy? Get ready to be amazed as we take a journey through the vast expanse of the universe and compare the size of our humble planet Earth to other planets and stars out there.
But wait, there's more! Not only will you be entertained by the incredible visuals that showcase just how tiny our planet is in comparison, but you'll also be educated on the mind-bending facts and figures that will make you question everything you thought you knew about the universe. So sit back, relax, and prepare to have your mind blown!
Here Are Some of Our Planets
Pluto, the smallest planet in our solar system, was discovered in 1930 by the American astronomer Clyde W. Tombaugh and named after the Roman god of the underworld. It was reclassified as a dwarf planet in 2006. It has a diameter of 2,376.6 km.
Mercury was first observed by the astronomer's Galileo Galilei and Thomas Harriot in 1610 and is named after the Roman deity Mercury, the messenger of the gods. It has the most craters in the solar system and is the smallest planet in our solar system. It is 4,879 km in diameter.
Mars, often described as the red planet was first identified by Galileo Galilei in 1610 and named after the Roman god of war and the second-smallest planet in the solar system measuring in at 6,779 km in diameter.
Venus, named after Aphrodite, the ancient Roman goddess of love and beauty, is the brightest planet in the sky. It is referred to as the 'morning star' and 'evening star' and was first seen with a telescope by Galileo Galilei in 1610. Mars is about 12,104 km in diameter.
Earth is the only planet not named after a mythological being. It was once believed to be the centre of the universe. Earth is around 12,756 km in diameter and the third planet from the sun.
Keep scrolling as Earth gets a lot smaller.
Huge
Look how small Earth (lower left ) now looks next to Neptune.
Neptune, was named after Poseidon, the Roman god of the sea, and is the farthest known planet from the sun. It is the fourth largest planet in our solar system with a diameter of 49,244 km and is classified as a gas giant."
Saturn was first observed by Galileo Galilei with a telescope in 1610. It was named after the Roman god of agriculture and is the sixth planet from the Sun. Saturn is the father of Jupiter and is 116,460 km in diameter.
Uranus, often referred to as an 'ice planet' looks tiny compared to the gas giants Jupiter and Saturn. Uranus was named after the Greek god of the sky and was first observed by the British astronomer William Herschel in 1881, and named by the German astronomer Johann Elert Bode. Uranus is 50,724 km in diameter.
Jupiter is the largest planet in the solar system and the 5th planet from the sun. It was discovered by Galileo in 1609 and was named after the Roman god Jupiter. It is 142,984 km in diameter.
Enormous
As we venture towards the gas giants of our solar system, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus and Neptune are barely visible. Earth is just about visible at this scale and Jupiter, the giant among planets in our system is just a single pixel and is 318 times bigger than Earth.
The Sun, The Sun is a yellow dwarf star at the center of the solar system. More than one million Earths could fit inside the sun.
Gigantic
As we travel farther into space, even the Sun looks tiny compared to Sirius, Pollux and Arcturus.
Sirius. is a "white to blue" star and was first observed by the American astronomer and telescope maker, Alvan Graham Clark in 1852. It is called the 'Dog Star' because it is part of the constellation Canis Major, which means "the greater dog." It is the brightest star in the night sky and is about 1.7 times the diameter of the Sun, which makes its diameter around 1.7 million km.
Pollux, is a giant orange star located in the constellation Gemini. It is about 34 light-years from the Sun and has a diameter of around 8.8 times that of the Sun, which makes it around 12.2 million km in diameter.
Arcturus, is a giant orange star located in the constellation Boötes and was first observed by the Greek astronomer Hipparchus in 129 BC. It has a diameter of around 26.3 million km and is about 37 light-years away from Earth. Over 1700 Suns could fit into Arcturus..
Colossal
As we travel even farther out, even the massive stars look so small in comparison with these humongous sizes.
Rigel, also known as 'the left leg of the giant,' is a blue supergiant that was discovered in the early 1600s by the German astronomer Johann Bayer. It has a diameter of about 116 million km.
Aldebaran, which is the fourteenth-brightest star in the night sky, is similar in size to Orion and is the brightest star in the celestial equator. It was discovered by the English astronomer William Herschel in 1782. Aldebaran has a diameter of 61.402 million km and is 153 times brighter than the sun.
Betelgeuse is an orange-red star that is one of three stars that make up the Winter Triangle, an astronomical asterism formed from three of the brightest stars in the winter sky. It has a diameter of about 1.234 billion km, which is 141,863 times larger than the diameter of the Earth.
The Pistol Star, a blue hypergiant star and one of the most luminous known stars in the Milky Way, was discovered using the Hubble Space Telescope by the American astronomer Don Figer. It emits light 10 million times brighter than the Sun and is the brightest known star in the galaxy. Please note that it is not shown in the images.
Antares, meaning 'opponent to Mars,' was discovered by the Austrian astronomer Johann Tobia Burg in 1819. It is 10 times bigger than the Sun and has a diameter of about 700 times that of the Sun. Antares is located approximately 604 light-years away from Earth
Monstrous
As we travel to the largest known stars, to try to comprehend the sizes involved here is mind-boggling and incomprehensible!
Mu Cephei, also known as the Garnet Star, was discovered by the English astronomer William Herschel in 1848. This red supergiant star is approximately 100,000 times brighter than the Sun, has a diameter of 1.753 billion km, and is located about 2,838 light years away from Earth.
VV Cephei was discovered in 1936 by the American astronomer Dean McLaughlin. This star has a diameter of 1,900 times that of the Sun, is about 1,400 times bigger than the Sun, and is located approximately 5,000 light years away from Earth.
VY Canis Majoris, a red hypergiant star, was first observed by the French astronomer Jerome Lalande in 1801. This supergiant star has a diameter of approximately 1.9758 billion km and is located about 3,900 light years away from the solar system.
Humongous: Unbelievable 'mind-boggling' sized star in our universe is UY Scuti
UY Scuti is a hypergiant star that was discovered by German astronomers at the Bonn Observatory in 1860. It is currently considered the largest known star and has a size estimated to be around 2.3765 billion km in diameter, which is approximately 1,700 times larger than the diameter of the Sun. UY Scuti is also estimated to be around 5 billion times larger than the Sun in terms of its volume. To put its size in perspective, 6 quadrillion 489 trillion Earths could fit into the volume of UY Scuti.
Earth: Amazing Feats
- On May 20, 1932, Amelia Mary Earhart, an American aviation pioneer, became the first female aviator to fly solo across the Atlantic Ocean, not the world. She completed the flight from Newfoundland, Canada, to Northern Ireland in approximately 15 hours.
- On July 22nd, 1933, Wiley Post, an American aviator, became the first pilot to fly solo around the world in an aircraft named Winnie Mae. It took him 7 days, 18 hours, and 49 minutes
- On June 20, 1970, Dave Kunst, an American adventurer, became the first person to walk around the Earth. The journey took him four years, three months, and 16 days to complete.
Spectacular Video: Major Planets and Star Size Comparison
On the grand scale of things with potentially, hundreds of billions of galaxies within the universe filled with over 1,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 planets, and an estimated 1 billion trillion stars in the observable universe, It makes everything in life - all my problems and worries feel so insignificant and unimportant — as insignificant to life as a grain of sand.
Do you think that "intelligent life" exists on a Planet in a Universe somewhere?
- 92% Yes. I truly believe it's possible
- 2% No. Impossible
- 6% I have no idea
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