Tallest mountain on Venus

The tallest mountain on Venus is Skadi Mons, a peak in the Maxwell Montes massif that rises 11,520 m (37,795 ft) above the average planetary radius (the baseline used in place of sea level on Venus).

Maxwell Montes rises sharply above the eastern end of a high plateau called the Lakshmi Planum on a continent-sized highland area known as the Ishtar Terra. Maxwell Montes is notable for being the only significant feature on Venus that is named for a man (physicist James Clerk Maxwell) – all other features are named for female-identified goddesses, mythical figures and historical personages. The highest peak in the range is named for the Norse goddess Skadi (also known as Skaði or Skathi), who was associated with mountains, winter and hunting.

The existence of this highland region was first suggested by radar scans of Venus carried out in 1967 at the Arecibo Radio Telescope in Puerto Rico. Data gathered during the Soviet Union's Venera programme and the American Pioneer 12 mission suggested the peaks of the Maxwell Montes were no more than 10,700 m (35,104 ft) high, but this was later revised up following more detailed radar scans of the planet's surface by the Magellan spacecraft (which mapped the planet from orbit between 1990 and 1994).