News Digging > Culture > Uranus got its moons when a big rocky planet whacked it. Maybe.
Uranus got its moons when a big rocky planet whacked it. Maybe.
Uranus got its moons when a big rocky planet whacked it. Maybe.,Uranus is weird*. For one thing, something knocked it over on its axis. Earth, for example, has its rotation axis — the north/south pole line — tipped over by about 23° from the plane of its orbit, but Uranus is tipped by a whopping 98°. That’s never been conclusively explained.

Uranus got its moons when a big rocky planet whacked it. Maybe.

Uranus is weird*. For one thing, something knocked it over on its axis. Earth, for example, has its rotation axis — the north/south pole line — tipped over by about 23° from the plane of its orbit, but Uranus is tipped by a whopping 98°. That’s never been conclusively explained.