The order of the planets, starting closest to the sun: Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, Neptune.
The one place where a flag flies all day, never goes up or comes down, and does not get saluted, is the moon.
Earth is not round; it is slightly pear-shaped. The North Pole radius is 44mm longer than the South Pole radius.
The crawler, the machine that takes the Space Shuttle to the launching pad moves at 3km/h (2 mph).
Oceanography, the study of oceans, is a mixture of biology, physics, geology and chemistry.
The sun is 330,330 times larger than the earth. See the size of the sun in comparison.
The largest iceberg ever recorded was 335km (208 miles) long and 97km (60 miles) wide.
During a total solar eclipse the temperature can drop by 6 degrees Celsius (about 20 degrees Fahrenheit).
There are 1040 islands around Britain, one of which is the smallest island in the world: Bishop's Rock.
All the planets in the solar system rotate anticlockwise, except Venus. It is the only planet that rotates clockwise.
Earth is the densest planet in the solar system and the only one not named after a god.
Earth orbits the sun at an average speed of 29.79 km/s (18.51 miles/sec), or about 107 000 km/h (about 67,000 miles/hour).
The magnetic north pole is near Ellef Ringes Island in northern Canada.
The magnetic south pole was discovered off the coast of Wilkes Land in Antarctica.
The deepest mine in the world is Western Deep Levels near Carltonville, South Africa. It is 4,2km (2.6 miles) deep.
The deepest point in the sea: the Mariana Trench off Guam in the Pacific Ocean; it is 10,9 km (6.77 miles) below sea level.
The tallest mountain on earth is under the ocean: Mauna Kea in Hawaii is 10,200 metres (33,465 ft) high. Mount Everest is 8,848 metres (29,029 ft) high.
About 500 small meteorites fall to earth every year but most fall in the sea and in unpopulated areas.
There is no record of a person being killed by a meteorite but animals are occasionally hit.
A storm officially becomes a hurricane when cyclone winds reach 119 km/h (74 mph).