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An area called the scattered disk overlaps part of the
Kuiper belt. And it stretches far, far out into space.
The scattered disk is twice as big as the area
occupied by the eight planets plus the Kuiper belt.
Now that’s pretty big!
What’s in the scattered disk? Lots of small icy
objects. The biggest one is named Eris. It is a
dwarf planet.
Sometimes the icy objects get knocked out
of their orbits. Then they become
comets
.
Comets race toward the Sun in a new orbit
shaped like a cucumber.
When a comet gets close to the Sun, it
begins to melt. It gives off gases that glow.
The gases form a long tail that can stretch up
to 155 million miles (250 million km).
What’s the
Scatter?
