Mercury

Because Mercury is so close to the Sun, it is hard to directly observe from Earth, except during twilight. Mercury makes an appearance indirectly, however 13 times each century, Earth observers can watch Mercury pass across the face of the Sun, an event called a transit. These rare transits fall within several days of May 8 and November 10. The first two transits of Mercury in the 21st century oc…

Named after the Roman god of commerce, travel and thievery, Mercury is the second smallest planet in the solar system, larger only than Pluto, the most distant planet in our solar system. If Earth were the size of a baseball, Mercury would be the size of a golf ball. Viewed from Mercury, the Sun would look almost three times as large as it does from Earth.

Mercury - Pictures and Astronomy Facts - Solar System Planetary Astronomical Data and pictures of Mercury. Astronomy Guide to Space exploration close to home. Information on our solar system. Named after the Roman god of commerce, travel and thievery, Mercury is the closest planet to the Sun and the eighth largest. Mercury's existence has been known of since before the third century BC.

On 10/6/08, at roughly 4:40 AM ET, MESSENGER flew by Mercury for the 2nd time this year. During the encounter, the probe swung just 125 miles above the cratered surface of Mercury, snapping hundreds of pictures and collecting a variety of other data from the planet as it gains a critical gravity assist that keeps the probe on track to become the first spacecraft ever to orbit the innermost planet…

Discover Mercury astronomy facts as part of our solar system planetary tour. Find Mercury planetary data and pictures. Mercury, closest planet to the Sun and smallest.