How Many Moons Does Mars Have ?

Even though the speculations about the existence of life on Mars has brought the planet back into the limelight, not many people out there can boast of knowing everything about this planet. Among the various lesser known facts about planet Mars, one of the most prominent fact is related to its natural satellites, i.e. the exact number of moons of Mars to be precise. It wouldn't be surprising to see people left unanswerable when asked how many moons does Mars have. Not many people are aware of the fact that other planets also have their own moons. While planet Jupiter leads the pack with a count of 63 known moons, Saturn has 61 moons orbiting it and Uranus has 27.

The fact that planet Mars has 2 moons may come as a surprise for many, as this planet is half the size of planet Earth, which has only 1 moon. The speculation that planet Mars has moons surfaced long before Asaph Hall, Sr., actually discovered them in 1877. For instance, the famous German astronomer, Johannes Kepler had predicted that Mars has two moons way back in the 17th century. That, however, didn't quite hold ground as his claims were more of assumptions which lacked scientific support. Kepler's claims that Mars had two moons were based on the fact that the Earth had one moon and planet Jupiter was believed to have 4 moons.

The two moons of planet Mars are named Phobos and Deimos, after the sons of Ares - the God of War in Greek mythology. While the former represents 'fear', the latter represents 'terror'. These moons of Mars were discovered by Asaph Hall, Sr., an American astronomer, on August 12, 1877. Owing to their irregular shape, astronomers believe that these moons are actually captured asteroids. A comparison with the Earth's moon shows that the Mars moons are different from it in several aspects.

Among the two moons, Phobos is the larger moon and has a diameter of 14.1 miles, while Deimos is smaller and has a diameter of 7.82 miles. The orbit of Phobos can be located at a distance of 5826.59 miles from the surface of the planet, whereas the orbit of Deimos can be located at a distance of 14577.36 miles from the planet. Considering that the orbit of Earth's moon is 238856.95 miles away from the surface of the planet, one can say that the moons of Mars orbit the planet at a very close range. Another major difference between the two moons is that Phobos travels from west to east, while Deimos travels from east to west. Phobos takes 7 hours and 39 minutes to orbit planet Mars, while Deimos takes 30 days i.e. 1.2 Martian days to orbit the planet. Recent observations have revealed that the gravity of planet Mars is slowing down the orbit of Phobos. Going by the speed at which this is happening, Phobos will reach the Roche limit, i.e. the limit up to which a natural satellite can close in on its parent body, and get disintegrated within a a span of 15 million years. NASA has managed to collect a significant amount of information about Phobos and Deimos but that doesn't mean we know everything about them.If this information about how many moons does Mars have took you by surprise, knowing about the moons of Jupiter or how many moons does Saturn have is bound to leave you bewildered. NASA's efforts to facilitate low cost planetary exploration opened the realms of the solar system for mankind. With NASA continuing its space escapades, it wouldn't be surprising if yet another fascinating attribute of Mars surfaces sometime in the near future.