Do you know the earth's "sister planet"? It is the second planet from the sun.It looks as large as the earth. It is close to the earth. Yes, it is Venus.
Scientists have been learning about Venus for a long time. First, they looked at Venus through telescopes. But Venus is covered with thick clouds. Scientists could not see Venus well through the clouds, so they made guesses about it.
For a long time, scientists thought that there were plants and water in Venus. They thought Venus might have animals too, but they didn't know for sure.
Then scientists found a way to learn more about Venus. In the 1960s, they began sending probes to Venus. The probes flew through the thick clouds and took pictures of Venus up close. They found out many things too. The probes sent the pictures and things they found out back to the scientists.
The scientists learned a lot from the probes. First, they learned that most of their guesses were not right. And they learned that Venus was very hot.
After that, scientists knew they could not send people to Venus. But they still wanted to know more about it, so they sent new probes. These new probes took great pictures of the planet. The pictures showed that there are plains and mountains in Venus! And in some ways,Venus looks like the earth.
