What If You Spent 5 Seconds on Venus?

Welcome to Hell yep sorry I meant Venus welcome to Venus some say it's Earth's twin but this world is nothing like home and you're about to experience this scorching hot landscape firsthand your mission is to spend five seconds on this hellish planet and trust me these are going to be a very long five seconds foreign and our nearest neighbor at its closest approach Venus is a mere 40 million kilometers away from us after just four months in space you'd finally be able to witness this beautiful but deadly Planet up close four and a half billion years ago Venus and Earth formed in the same corner of our solar system this space rock is about the same size as earth and its gravity is similar to but unlike our home the surface situation on Venus is Extreme we know this because we've sent probes to this scorching world some probes orbited it some made a flyby and some even landed on the surface of Venus but those didn't last very long what happened to them well that's what you're about to find out time to make your way down to the surface ah don't these clouds look beautiful well don't inhale them these yellowish bands streaking across the sky are clouds of sulfuric acid if you could only get a whiff of them you'd smell the reek of rotten eggs but to do that you'd need to remove your helmet and I definitely do not recommend that at a height of 50 kilometers above the surface visibility is poor you'd hardly be able to see anything the incredibly thick atmosphere would block views of this planet and its tens of thousands of volcanoes the atmosphere is mostly made up of carbon dioxide and because it's so thick it traps heat on the planet's surface keeping it nice and toasty just how toasty are we talking oh you're gonna find out the hard way as you descend another 15 kilometers the haze would begin to clear the world below would finally reveal itself a rust-colored surface covered in mountains and volcanoes looks like this volcano is still active you'd fly around a little to collect some samples and take in the view yep the atmosphere is mostly carbon dioxide with traces of nitrogen that checks out okay well let's see if you can land here this looks like the spot uh looks like there's no signal initiating The Landing sequence without clearance fingers crossed Landing your spacecraft would kick up clouds of dust that would take several minutes to settle down in the soupy atmosphere as it clears you'd look up into the sky but you wouldn't find the familiar yellow circle of the Sun on Venus it always looks like Dawn no matter what time of day it is that's because the venusian atmosphere only lets about 10 percent of the sunlight that hits it reach the surface what wait what were we saying earlier about the space probe that landed on Venus oh yeah Venera 13. this Soviet probe made its fatal Landing back in 1981. it Survived The Descent and lasted for a whopping 127 minutes that's longer than any other spacecraft that had made it to the surface but then Venera 13 gave way to the violent uninviting environment of this hell it was likely crushed under extreme pressure or it melted but it's too late to turn around now you've lived through the one hour long landing and you're so close all you need to do to complete your mission is to spend five seconds out there hey yeah out there in the most extreme environment you've ever been to foreign whoa the atmosphere is so strange you can hardly lift your arms even though Venus has about the same gravity as Earth you'd be feeling the sheer weight of its immensely dense air it would feel like you were walking through water very hot water and you'd be glad you were wearing so much protective gear a quick look at your thermometer would tell you that it's a sweltering 475 degrees Celsius out here that's hot enough to melt lead your pressurized suit would be working hard to keep you safe without it you'd be crushed under all that pressure before you could even complete your mission this isn't so bad after all hey if a spacecraft could last over two hours some 40 years ago well you and your shiny new gear can survive longer right Venus is right here for you to discover just take a few more steps suddenly something distracts you from the first ever first-hand human analysis of Venus's surface conditions your protective suit breaks the DraStic pressure shift would immediately make you feel like you were deep underwater with an atmospheric pressure 90 times that of Earth Venus would be crushing you from all directions at the same time you'd be struggling to breathe in an atmosphere without any Oxygen any atmosphere you did manage to inhale would scald the inside of your mouth and the top of your throat unless you could scramble very quickly back to the safety of your spacecraft you'd be dead within seconds hey it could be worse high above you sulfuric acid clouds would be raining acid but in this unbearably hot environment the toxic rain wouldn't reach the surface it would evaporate long before that so at least you wouldn't have to worry about acid dissolving your skin and bones that would be kind of gruesome you know in hindsight maybe we shouldn't have sent you down to explore this hellish surface we probably should have terraformed Venus into a more hospitable Planet first but that's a story for another what if [Music] [Music]

Channel: What If

Views: 1,190,244

Keywords: what if, what happens if, scifi, science documentary, what if scenario, mysteries, venus, planet venus, life on venus, exploring venus, venus facts, what if cosmos, science, venus planet, facts about venus, cosmos, hypothetical scenario, astronomy, nasa, planets, venus surface, is there life on venus, venus documentary, space documentary, venus atmosphere, hypothetical scenarios, venus life, spacex, spacex starship, starship spacex, elon musk, Phosphine, Sulphur dioxide

Id: MYyXULpYubo

Length: 8min 7sec (487 seconds)

Published: Sat Jul 01 2023