A strange lunar crater
Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter recently celebrated its 1000th day of imaging in orbit around the Moon, snapping images and cataloging the Moon’s geology.
Only a week before the science team posted a spectacular oblique view of Ryder Crater. The image is visible below the fold, along with a close-up of the crater’s strange hump-backed boulder-strewn floor.
As the scientists note,
Ryder crater is rather oddly shaped; is it two craters or one? It is 17 km in the long direction and 13 km in its shortest dimension. The western floor of the crater is about 1500 meters below the western rim, while the eastern rim is 3000 meters above the same floor. The eastern shelf, seen in today’s Featured Image, is 5000 meters above the western rim!
The scientists speculate that the crater’s strange shape is probably because of several factors. For one, the crater formed on a steep slope. For another, it appears the crater was caused by an oblique impact of an object that had split prior to contact.
What I like is the beauty and clarity of the images. LRO is truly allowing us to see the lunar surface as it really is.
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I visited the Moon’s surface this past week to do a little prospecting and took these “close in” aerial photos of scale approx. [_________] = 1 to 100 feet. Please visit the URL: http://target.lroc.asu.edu/q3/
to verify my findings of perhaps abandoned LEM descent stages, left on the surface of the moon (and perhaps a moon buggy). I found two locations actually (on my own, perhaps not documented by anyone else?). Coordinates are…
LOCATION 1: Lat: 9.8608 Lon: -19.8189 very accurate, right on top of it within Copernicus Crater.
LOCATION 2: Lat: 0.1187 Lon: 0.7442 very accurate, right on top of it.
Objects of interest are both about 25 feet diameter, similar shape, and about the diameter of a lunar lander.
The protruding arm may be the lunar ladder?
You might be able to see my posted photos at my FACEBOOK page. Then click on a photo to enlarge it:
https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=10211942861864446&set=a.1146189252451.2023140.1159130468&type=3&theater
https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=10211838608898187&set=pcb.10211838623338548&type=3&theater
https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=10211838735341348&set=pcb.10211838623338548&type=3&theater