Table of Contents
What craters does Mercury have?
| Crater | Coordinates | Diameter (km) |
|---|---|---|
| Anguissola | 80.69°N 217.35°W | 35.41 |
| Anyte | 79.5°N 210.67°W | 20.92 |
| Apollodorus | 30.54°N 163.28°E | 41.5 |
| Aristoxenus | 83.93°N 17.46°W | 52.14 |
Can you find craters on Mercury?
Craters are found on all of the terrestrial planets—Mercury, Venus, Earth and Mars. The surfaces of asteroids and the rocky, ice covered moons of the outer gas planets are cratered as well.
What does surface of Mercury look like?
Mercury’s surface resembles that of Earth’s Moon, scarred by many impact craters resulting from collisions with meteoroids and comets. Most of Mercury’s surface would appear greyish-brown to the human eye. The bright streaks are called “crater rays.” They are formed when an asteroid or comet strikes the surface.
Why are there craters on Mercury?
On the presumption that Mercury’s craters were produced by the same populations of remnant planetary building blocks (planetesimals), asteroids, and comets that struck the Moon, most of the craters would have formed before and during an especially intense period of bombardment in the inner solar system, which on the …
What made the craters on Mercury?
How do you identify a crater?
Identifying impact craters
- A layer of shattered or “brecciated” rock under the floor of the crater.
- Shatter cones, which are chevron-shaped impressions in rocks.
- High-temperature rock types, including laminated and welded blocks of sand, spherulites and tektites, or glassy spatters of molten rock.
Can you see Mercury without a telescope?
Yes, Mercury is one of the five planets (excluding Earth) that you can see relatively easily with the naked eye. It’s the most difficult of those five planets but it is certainly possible to see without a telescope. This means that Mercury is visible for some time after sunset or before sunrise.
How big are the craters on Mercury compared to the Moon?
Impact craters. The higher gravity also means that the complex forms and structures characteristic of larger craters—central peaks, slumped crater walls, and flattened floors—occur in smaller craters on Mercury (minimum diameters of about 10 km [6 miles]) than on the Moon (about 19 km [12 miles]).
What does Mercury look like from space?
The planet Mercury looks a little bit like Earth’s moon. Like our Moon, Mercury’s surface is covered with craters caused by space rock impacts. Mercury is the closest planet to the sun and the eighth largest. It has a diameter of 4,880 kilometers.
What kind of features are found on Mercury?
Ridge and trough systems unique to Mercury have been observed in MESSENGER imagery. These features form in relation to “ghost craters,” impact craters that are filled and buried by volcanic deposits, but whose outline is revealed by ridges that form over the crater rim.
Is there a double ringed crater on Mercury?
A double-ringed crater on Mercury filled with plains material, in an image taken by the Messenger probe on January 14, 2008. There are at least three ways that planets are resurfaced, and all three may have had a role in creating Mercury’s plains.