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