Toutatis Radar map of Toutatis, courtesy of LANL . In December of 1992, it passed within 4 million km of the Earth, and at this time radar images like the one above, were made using powerful transmitters in the Californian Mojave desert. This indicates that at some time, the asteroid was subject to very severe collisions. Gaspra 11 views of the approach to Gaspra, courtesy of LANL . Gaspra was discovered in 1916, and it became particularly interesting to scientists when it was found that the Galileo spacecraft, en route to Jupiter, would pass close by.
Craters are clearly visible, but all are small.
The asteroid is believed to be made of metal-rich material. The image presented here shows the view of Gaspra from Galileo as the spacecraft drew closer in to the object, and span 5 hours 15 minutes from first to last image. Since the rotation period of Gaspra is about 7 hours, these images show the asteroid through almost a complete revolution. Note that a second image of Gaspra is presented at the top of this page. It is believed that the brighter areas are fresh rock exposed by comparatively recent collisions, with darker areas being a much older surface.