July 23, 2013

The Far Wall

image by Jocelyn Serot, France

Seeing craters on the limb gives a different perspective of their inner walls. Looking at similar oblique views of Copernicus we see some discrete steps from the rim crest to the crater floor. In Jocelyn's image we see the far rim of Bailly in a sort of 3-D, rather than a standard 2-D top down view. At the upper left there is a hint of one residual terrace half way down the wall, but overall the wall is smoothed and relatively featureless. It becomes low and then rises and is brighter in the center of the view here. To the right of that the wall is lower and seems to be striated towards the right. In fact, the continuation of this striation continues across the floor of Bailly. This is ejecta from the formation of the Orientale Basin, both a blanket of debris and crater chains.

Chuck Wood

Technical Details
7-22-13, 02-07-26. C11 at prime focus, IR-pass 685mm, Basler ac1300-gm camera. Processing: Autostakkert2 + Registax 6 (300/3000). The Moon was almost full (98%) and low on the horizon (~23°) yesterday, with poor seeing but favorable libration in latitude for showing Bailly.

Related Links
21st Century Atlas charts L4-L5.
Jocelyn's website
A stereo view

Yesterday's LPOD: 25" of Albategnius

Tomorrow's LPOD: Wide Base Line Stereo

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