August 3, 2008
Rim Peaks?
Apollo 17 160-23992 image from Lunar & PLanetary Science Institute Apollo Image Atlas
With its small dynamic range this looks like a radar image, but its not. It is one of the 35 mm images shot out the command module window by the Apollo 17 crew. The view looks alien but slightly familiar. Its a mare surface with protruding hills. There are few places on the Moon where that occurs - this terrain is west of the Carpatians where the rim of the Imbrium Basin disappears. The big, simple-rimmed crater near the center used to be called Euler P but now is known as Natasha, and the simple crater above it on the edge of the image is Jehan, formerly Euler K. There is too little of this hilly terrain exposed to tell exactly what it is/was but presumably it was part of Imbrium's rim - imagine how the Carpatians would look if lavas covered half of their heights. The small sinuous Euler Rille is at the upper right, and a series of rimless collapse pits define collapsed lava tubes near the middle of the right edge. A steep-edged surface swell, about the same size as Natasha is a little below it. A more interesting large dome is just above left of center - it is about 15 km wide and has an elongated rimless collapse pit to the left of its summit.
Chuck Wood
Related Links
Rükl plate 19
A wider Apollo 17 view
Great terrestrial view
Yesterday's LPOD: A Round World
Tomorrow's LPOD: Especially Worthy of Scrutiny
COMMENTS?
Register, Log in, and join in the comments.
