The Planet Where Sunrise Reverses

Transcript

From certain places on Mercury, the Sun can rise, sink below the horizon, then rise again.

The trick is a slow spin and an oval-shaped orbit.

Mercury turns once in about fifty-nine Earth days, while a trip around the Sun takes about eighty-eight.

Near its closest approach, Mercury sweeps around the Sun faster than it turns on its axis.

For a while, that makes the Sun seem to move backwards across the sky.

As Mercury moves away and slows down, the Sun resumes its usual direction.

One sunrise. A rewind. Then sunrise again.

Attribution

Mercury imagery: NASA/Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory/Carnegie Institution of Washington; original AI-assisted surface illustration and animation by AskPandi; voiceover generated with ElevenLabs. ^{[1] [2] [3] [4]}