Mar Facts | Facts about Mars

Has a piece of the Wright Flyer been to other worlds?

Pieces of the original Wright Flyer have traveled to the Moon on Apollo 11 and to Mars on NASA's Ingenuity helicopter.

Mars is red because of iron oxide, or rust, on its surface.

Scientists think the Moon formed from debris after a Mars-sized object crashed into the young Earth.

Mars's Olympus Mons is about three times taller than Mount Everest.

Valles Marineris, a canyon system on Mars, is about as long as the US is wide.

Mars's moon Phobos is slowly spiraling inward and is expected to break apart or crash into Mars in tens of millions of years.

NASA's Ingenuity helicopter made the first powered flight on another planet, on Mars in 2021.

Sunsets on Mars appear blue.

A year on Mars is about 687 Earth days.

Dust storms on Mars can cover the entire planet.

NASA lost the Mars Climate Orbiter in 1999 because one team used imperial units and another used metric units.

Mars's polar ice caps contain both water ice and frozen carbon dioxide.

Meteorites from Mars have been found on Earth.

A piece of the original Wright Flyer went to the Moon on Apollo 11 in 1969, and another flew to Mars on NASA's Ingenuity helicopter in 2021.