Early yesterday morning (Tues March 29 at 5:20am EDT) NASA’s MESSENGER spacecraft took this historic image – the first ever image of Mercury from orbit. The large crater dominating the image with large, bright rays is Debussy. The smaller crater to the west of Debussy with its unusually dark rays is Matabei. This image also includes a portion of Mercury’s surface never before seen by spacecraft.
MESSENGER is still in pre-science ops, and the year-long primary science phase of the mission, which beings April 4, calls for another 75,000 images of Mercury.
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