It 'snows' metal on Venus.
Venus Has Metal Snow on Its Mountain Peaks
Imagine a world where the snowcaps on mountains aren't made of water ice, but of heavy metals. On Venus, this isn't science fiction—it's the bizarre reality of our solar system's hottest planet.
Venus is often called Earth's "twin" due to its similar size, but that's where the similarities end. With surface temperatures averaging 465°C (869°F)—hot enough to melt lead—and an atmosphere 90 times denser than Earth's, Venus is one of the most hostile places in our cosmic neighborhood.
The Mystery of the Shiny Peaks
When radar from NASA's Magellan spacecraft mapped Venus in the early 1990s, scientists noticed something strange. The planet's highest mountain peaks, particularly on Maxwell Montes (Venus's tallest mountain at 11 kilometers high), appeared unusually bright and reflective.
This puzzled researchers for years. On Earth, mountaintops are covered in water ice and snow. But on Venus, where the surface temperature could melt most metals, ice was impossible.
Heavy Metal Precipitation
The leading explanation is genuinely mind-blowing: metallic frost. Scientists believe that heavy metal compounds—likely lead sulfide (galena) and bismuth sulfide (bismuthinite)—vaporize in the scorching lowlands of Venus.
These metallic vapors rise through the thick atmosphere until they reach the cooler (relatively speaking) high-altitude peaks. There, at temperatures around 380°C, the metals condense and "snow" onto the mountaintops, coating them in a thin, shiny metallic layer.
It's essentially the same process as water precipitation on Earth, just with a much more metal playlist.
What This Metallic Snow Looks Like
If you could somehow stand on a Venusian mountain peak, you'd be surrounded by:
- A glistening, mirror-like coating of metallic frost
- Shimmering surfaces reflecting the dim, orange-filtered sunlight
- A landscape that looks like it's been spray-painted with molten silver
The metallic layer is estimated to be only a few centimeters thick in most places, but it's enough to create those distinctive radar-bright signatures that first caught scientists' attention.
Still Mysteries to Solve
While the metal snow hypothesis is widely accepted, scientists aren't 100% certain which metals are involved. Some researchers have proposed alternative explanations, including iron pyrite (fool's gold) or even exotic compounds we haven't yet identified.
Future missions to Venus, including NASA's VERITAS and DAVINCI+ missions planned for the late 2020s and early 2030s, may finally confirm what's falling on those alien peaks. Until then, Venus remains a reminder that the universe's imagination far exceeds our own—where else would you find a planet with heavy metal weather?