PIA13840: High-Resolution View from Mercury Flyby 1


High-Resolution View from Mercury Flyby 1

Caption:

This high-resolution mosaic of NAC images shows Mercury as it appeared to MESSENGER as the spacecraft departed the planet following the mission's first flyby of Mercury . This mosaic resembles the historic first image transmitted back to Earth after that flyby and shows a portion of the planet never previously seen by spacecraft. The MESSENGER mission is on track to again make history and in 38 days to become the first spacecraft ever to orbit Mercury.

Date Acquired: January 14, 2008
Instrument: Narrow Angle Camera (NAC) of the Mercury Dual Imaging System (MDIS)
Scale: The diameter of Mercury is 4880 kilometers (3030 miles)

Background Info:

These images are from MESSENGER, a NASA Discovery mission to conduct the first orbital study of the innermost planet, Mercury. For information regarding the use of images, see the MESSENGER image use policy .

Cataloging Keywords:

Name Value Additional Values
Target Mercury
System
Target Type Planet
Mission MESSENGER
Instrument Host MESSENGER
Host Type Orbiter
Instrument Mercury Dual Imaging System (MDIS)
Detector Narrow Angle Camera (NAC)
Extra Keywords Grayscale
Acquisition Date
Release Date 2011-02-07
Date in Caption 2008-01-14
Image Credit NASA/Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory/Carnegie Institution of Washington
Source photojournal.jpl.nasa.gov/catalog/PIA13840
Identifier PIA13840