Messenger's approach to Mercury is chronicled in this image taken by the Wide Angle Camera on Messenger. Today, NASA's spacecraft MESSENGER , or the MErcury Surface, Space ENvironment, GEochemistry, and Ranging spacecraft, is expected to begin its two day mission at about noon ( eastern time ), of data collecting and photographing of the planet Mercury. It is the first spacecraft to visit the planet in 34 years, since Mariner 10 's visit to the planet in 1974. This encounter will provide a critical gravity assist needed to keep the spacecraft on track for its March 2011 orbit insertion, beginning an unprecedented yearlong study of Mercury. The flyby also will gather essential data for mission planning. It will flyby an impact crater called the Caloris basin which is almost 800 miles (1,287 kilometers) in diameter. The basin is one of the largest impact craters in our solar system. "Caloris is huge, about a quarter of the diameter of Mercury, with rings of mountains within it that are up to two miles high. Mariner 10 saw a little less than half of the basin. During this first flyby, we will image the other side," said Louise Prockter, the instrument scientist for the Mercury Dual Imaging System at the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory in Laurel , Maryland.
Messenger's approach to Mercury is chronicled in this image taken by the Wide Angle Camera on Messenger. Today, NASA's spacecraft , or the MErcury Surface, Space ENvironment, GEochemistry, and Ranging spacecraft, is expected to begin its two day mission at about noon ( ), of data collecting and photographing of the planet Mercury. It is the first spacecraft to visit the planet in 34 years, since 's visit to the planet in 1974. This encounter will provide a critical gravity assist needed to keep the spacecraft on track for its March 2011 orbit insertion, beginning an unprecedented yearlong study of Mercury. The flyby also will gather essential data for mission planning. It will flyby an impact crater called the which is almost 800 miles (1,287 kilometers) in diameter. The basin is one of the largest impact craters in our solar system. "Caloris is huge, about a quarter of the diameter of Mercury, with rings of mountains within it that are up to two miles high. Mariner 10 saw a little less than half of the basin. During this first flyby, we will image the other side," said Louise Prockter, the instrument scientist for the Mercury Dual Imaging System at the in , Maryland.
D
MESSENGER
D
eastern time
D
Mariner 10
D
Caloris basin
R
Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory in Laurel
in