As large parts of the northerly Hemisphere meet the game of wondering if it will bamboozle for Christmas , we opine it might be fourth dimension to draw out the head beyond the Earth , starting with positioning closest to us and working out to planets orbiting other stars .
The Moon and Mercury
No .
Mercury and the Moon have no atmosphere , which is something of a requirement forsnow . Both of them are also blazing hot during the twenty-four hours , although as we will discover by and by , that is not quite as much of an obstruction as it might seem . However , both do get very stale at night , thanks to that lasting so long . Consequently , if either had a fragile standard atmosphere including water supply vaporization , warmth alone would not be an obstruction .
Venus
Venus of row has plenty of atm , but is for good far too hot for snow as we know it . However , Venus is so hot that iron pyrite mineral get vaporize at the surface , and can form ametallic froston the tops of mountains . Whether this drifts down like snow is something next missions may reveal . Perhaps Venus , not Finland , is the true dwelling house of heavy metallic element Charles Percy Snow .
Mars
Now things get interesting . The Martian polar icecaps are visible with average - sized backyard telescopes , at least when the planet is peculiarly close to us . Moreover , they can be ensure to full and wane with the season .
Orbiters have disclose the icecaps are topped by a stratum of frozen carbon dioxide ( dry glass ) . That ’s not surprising . The Martian standard atmosphere is 96 pct CO2 , and C dioxide freeze at -78 ° C ( -108 ° F ) . Unlike water system , it does n’t have a liquid phase , at least at Earthly or Martian atmospheric pressures , so there is no carbon dioxide pelting . alternatively , when it gets cold enough , some of the atmosphere solidifies .
Fortunately , that happens through a similar process to water vapor condensing in small geek on Earth , rather than sudden blocks of satisfying CO2forming .
These white areas on Io are sulfur compounds that have fallen as snow when the moon passes into Jupiter’s shadow.Image credit: NASA/JPL/USGS
Despite what anMMA fighter may tell you , Mars has a lot of Earth - like features , including its seasons , and when it ’s winter in one hemisphere , carbon dioxide snow flow at the poles and on high ground at temperate parallel of latitude .
Water molecules have a quite a little of strange features that CO2doesn’t parcel , so carbon dioxide snow bunting are different – much smaller as they go down and fain to pack together as regular hexahedron on the ground . The Martian standard atmosphere is so thin that future cosmonaut wo n’t need to worry about getting bamboozle in , but Dr Sylvain Piqueux of NASA ’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory told theSan Francisco Chronicle , “ Enough falls that you could snowshoe across it . ”
Mars even has something for the purists . Beneath the ironical meth layer , the pivotal ice cap are mostly frosty pee . Although it is probably a farseeing sentence since this fell as Charles Percy Snow , the Phoenix lander detected snow strike through the Martian upper atmosphere , and optical maser instrumentsrevealed this was water snow , not carbon paper dioxide . The lander also find itself surrounded by frost in winter and water ice-skating rink below ground .
We love you Pluto, and if we can keep Earth habitable, one day we might enyoy the nitrogen snow falling in your long winters.Image credit: NASA/Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory/Southwest Research Institute
The Charles Percy Snow dismiss in the standard atmosphere long before reaching Phoenix . However , Martian deal adulterate considerably gamy than the point where the snow was observed , which raises the interrogative sentence whether coke ever settles on the slopes of mountains like Olympus Mons .
We sleep with there was a level of water ice there20 million years ago , rather short by the monetary standard of Martian history . Indeed , sign of water snow as recently as400,000 class agohave been observe elsewhere on Mars , so maybe it is still take place .
The asteroid belt
Thediscovery of ice volcanoeswas one of the large surprises of theDawn charge to Ceres . We still do n’t understand what big businessman these , but the material they spit out is think to be a commixture of ice and flash-frozen methane . Some of their production flow like lava , but just as terrene volcanoes release ash there might be some ice speck thrown with more force that might lento settle . Smaller asteroids seem like less likely candidates for this sort of thing , but then we did n’t really bear it for Ceres either .
The gas giants
Jupiter has cloud of ammonia and water ice , and sometimes these may concentrate , although at least one expert argues the product are probablymore like hailthan snow .
Neptune and Uranus are both thought to have a character of snow made ofmethane icethat has nucleate around a particles of photochemical daze . The snow never reaches these planets ’ equivalent of a ground , instead turn back to natural gas at a currently - strange depth , but wait down on these worlds from domain , you ’d still know it was snowing down there .
It is also think that diamonds mayfall from the skyon Uranus and Neptune . pretty curiously , this is almost always consult to as a “ rain ” of diamond , but since the crystal of carbon paper are in spades hearty , not liquid , it would be more accurate to say it lead by the nose baseball field .
Icy moons
Most of the Moons of Jupiter , Saturn , and beyond do n’t ask to daydream of a lily-white Christmas , because they ’re permanently covered in meth , barricade the odd asteroid strike – but does any fall from the sky ? Permanent atmospheres are rarefied , but some of them may have something tight . The famous geyser of Enceladus spit out ice particles . Some of these escape the imperfect gravity to formSaturn ’s eastward - anchor ring , but some almost certainly drift back down , slow creating snow - alike conditions across much of the little moon . It ’s not seasonal , but it ’s still likely to be exceptionally beautiful .
Even where snow may not fall , there is a possibility some of these moons ’ surfaces arequite soft , more like newly fallen snowfall than ice . You could n’t keep an eye on it fall , but you could still enjoy roleplay in it .
Europa is also a candidate for something a piddling different : underwater C. P. Snow . Also know as frazil methamphetamine , this nearly pure sparkler fall like snow through the piquant H2O beneath ice shelves around Antarctica , and may come on Europa and other icy moons with inner oceans .
The special moons: Io and Titan
Instead of ice rink vent , Io has the real thing , and more than anywhere else in the Solar System . Parts of Io look like they ’re covered in snow , but it ’s in reality sulfur dioxide , and possibly some othersulfur - rich compounds . Io ’s volcanoes are so alive , it has a sort of lean S - based atmosphere , at least most of the time . Thiscollapsesevery time Io passes through Jupiter ’s shadow and the temperature drops by about 20 ° C ( 36 ° F ) , fall as something akin to snow .
Since Io orbits Jupiter every 1.8 days , and spend about 2 hour of that in the elephantine planet ’s vestige , that means you do n’t have to wait too long for a snow day on Io . Of course the Charles Percy Snow smells foul , and is probably toxic , but you ’d ask to be in a spacesuit anyway , so that should n’t stop you making snowmen , although arguably they ’d be pretty demonic .
Like Earth ’s , Titan ’s aura is mostly nitrogen . The next most rough-cut component is methane , which has both melt and stewing points quite skinny to Titan ’s average temperature ( −179.5 ° C , -291 ° F ) . That mean Titan sometimes rain methane , and when it does it ’s thought more complex hydrocarbons may be wash out as well , possibly in solid form , creating a blackened blow . Under the right circumstances , even the methane may snow out on its own .
Pluto
Ok , it ’s not aplanet , but that does n’t stand for Pluto ca n’t be fairly cool , as well as very , very cold . It ’s continue in nitrogen ice , with a picayune frosty methane and carbon monoxide : so do these ever fall as snow ? It seems so . Pluto ’s atmosphere is very slight , but also mostly nitrogen . It seems some of its ice turns to flatulency in whichever hemisphere is go through summertime . This builds up at first , but eventually the winter hemisphere cools enough for Baron Snow of Leicester to start . Pluto ’s long year means it takes a very long meter between snowfalls , but it is expected that between 2035 - 2050 it will set forth pull the wool over someone’s eyes in Pluto’ssouthern hemisphere . That ’s credibly too soon for us to send a mission , so we might need to waitress another 120 years until it ’s the northerly hemisphere ’s play .
We do n’t acknowledge enough about other Kuiper Belt object to really know , but the best guess is that the larger 1 are quite similar to Pluto , just with more dramatic season from having such stretch orbit .
Beyond the Solar System
Almost for sure Earth - like planet live where H2O snow is a coarse feature , but we have yet to confirm any . Our sample of exoplanets is skew towards gun giant and rocky worlds close enough to their star to be very spicy . We ’ve check some of the 2d category for ambiance , but even if planets likeTRAPPIST-1dturn out to have water vapor in the air , we will credibly necessitate to observe cooler I for water snow , and they ’re harder to analyze .
It ’s easy to keep the atmospheres of gas giants , and we ’ve discovered some with quite extraordinary message falling from their atmospheres as winds transmit them to the night side . These includetitanium dioxide(used in sunblock ) , fall as Charles Percy Snow . In other cases the products have a wider liquified phase , such as iron and jewels like rubies , so theyfall as raininstead .
All of these major planet are far too hot for us to ever chit-chat , so even if humanity sail to the stars , we ’ll never get to have snow - fights in any of these substance – your call if that ’s a good or bad affair .
Under colder fate , Neptune - style rhomb snowmight be quite a rough-cut feature of speech of carbon paper - full-bodied gas giants .
