As the solar wind flows around Venus, it creates similar space weather effects as it does near Earth. Credit: ESA/C. Carreau. Video description: a fiery corona around the planet Venus, surrounded by a teal glow. The video above is from YouTube because I could not get the embed code from NASA's site to work properly here, but the linked text is from NASA and points to NASA's video gallery.
Karen C. Fox of NASA Goddard Space Flight Center explains the phenomenon thoroughly on NASA's website:
In the grand scheme of the solar system, Venus and Earth are almost the same distance from the sun. Yet the planets differ dramatically: Venus is some 100 times hotter than Earth and its days more than 200 times longer. The atmosphere on Venus is so thick that the longest any spacecraft has survived on its surface before being crushed is a little over two hours. There's another difference, too. Earth has a magnetic field and Venus does not – a crucial distinction when assessing the effects of the sun on each planet.
As the solar wind rushes outward from the sun at nearly a million miles per hour, it is stopped about 44,000 miles away from Earth when it collides with the giant magnetic envelope that surrounds the planet called the magnetosphere. Most of the solar wind flows around the magnetosphere, but in certain circumstances it can enter the magnetosphere to create a variety of dynamic space weather effects on Earth. Venus has no such protective shield, but it is still an immovable rock surrounded by an atmosphere that disrupts and interacts with the solar wind, causing interesting space weather effects.
Read the whole thing. It's Neato.
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