• Question: do all the planets have moons?

    Asked by yassie to Adam, Catherine, Karen, Leila, Nazim on 19 Mar 2012.
    • Photo: Adam Stevens

      Adam Stevens answered on 19 Mar 2012:

      Mercury and Venus don’t, probably because they never got a chance to capture any asteroids as they are so close to the sun. All the other planets do.

    • Photo: Leila Battison

      Leila Battison answered on 19 Mar 2012:

      Not all planets have a moon, and we wouldn’t if we hadn’t had a bad collision with another planet early on in our history.

      But some planets have lots of moons – Jupiter has 66 and Saturn has 64! Probably because their big gravity means they can capture more passing asteroids into orbit.

    • Photo: Karen Masters

      Karen Masters answered on 19 Mar 2012:

      No – Mercury and Venus do no have moons.

    • Photo: Nazim Bharmal

      Nazim Bharmal answered on 19 Mar 2012:

      No, for example Mercury is perhaps too close to the sun. But most of them do, and the biggest ones like Jupiter have lots: I think Jupiter has about 30 actually, Jupiter has 66 moons!

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