Apollo (crater)
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| Crater characteristics | |
| Coordinates | 36.1° S, 151.8° W |
|---|---|
| Diameter | 538 km |
| Depth | Unknown |
| Colongitude | 161° at sunrise |
| Eponym | Project Apollo |
Apollo is an enormous impact crater located in the southern hemisphere on the far side of the Moon. But it is also the largest identified crater on the moon. This formation dwarfs the large Oppenheimer crater that is located next to the western rim. The crater Barringer lies across the northern wall. To the southeast is the Anders crater, and the Kleymenov crater is just to the east of the rim.
The Apollo walled-plain is a double-ringed formation with the inner ring roughly half the diameter of the outer wall. Both the outer wall and the interior have been heavily worn and eroded by subsequent impacts, so that significant parts of the outer and inner walls now consist of irregular and incised sections of mountainous arcs.
The interior floor is covered in a multitude of craters of various sizes. Several of the more notable craters have received names. The IAU used the eponyms of people associated with the Apollo program when designating some of these formations.
Sections of the Apollo crater interior have been resurfaced with lava, leaving patches of the floor with a lower albedo than the surroundings. There is a large patch of this lunar mare in the middle part of the inner ring, which contains some ray system markings. A long stretch of the mare lies along the southern part of the crater. There is also a smaller section near the western rim.
[edit] Interior craters
Several craters within the Apollo impact have been named to honor deceased NASA employees.
The Dryden crater is attached to the west-northwestern exterior of the inner ring. Chaffee is a similar-sized crater that lies partly across the southwest section of the inner ring. In the southeast part of the outer crater is the Borman crater. Inside the inner ring are the Resnik, McAuliffe, and Onizuka craters, and the Jarvis-McNair crater pair. The Smith crater lies across the northern part of the inner ring.
In 2006 the IAU approved a proposal to name seven interior craters to honor the astronauts of the Space Shuttle Columbia.[1][2]
| Crater | Coordinates | Diameter | Name source |
|---|---|---|---|
| Chawla | 15 km | Kalpana Chawla | |
| D. Brown | 15 km | David McD. Brown | |
| Husband | 29 km | Richard D. Husband | |
| L. Clark | 16 km | Laurel B. S. Clark | |
| McCool | 21 km | William C. McCool | |
| M. Anderson | 17 km | Michael P. Anderson | |
| Ramon | 17 km | Ilan Ramon |
Three of the crater names include the respective astronaut's first initials to distinguish them from the Anderson, Brown and Clark craters.
[edit] References
- ^ Blue, Jennifer (2006-07-27). Names for the Columbia astronauts provisionally approved. USGS Astrogeology. Retrieved on 2006-06-08.
- ^ Blue, Jennifer (August 30. 2006). Provisional Names Approved. USGS. Retrieved on 2007-05-07.
- Andersson, L. E.; Whitaker, E. A., (1982). NASA Catalogue of Lunar Nomenclature. NASA RP-1097.
- Blue, Jennifer (July 25, 2007). Gazetteer of Planetary Nomenclature. USGS. Retrieved on 2007-08-05.
- Bussey, B.; Spudis, P. (2004). The Clementine Atlas of the Moon. New York: Cambridge University Press. ISBN 0-521-81528-2.
- Cocks, Elijah E.; Cocks, Josiah C. (1995). Who's Who on the Moon: A Biographical Dictionary of Lunar Nomenclature. Tudor Publishers. ISBN 0-936389-27-3.
- McDowell, Jonathan (July 15, 2007). Lunar Nomenclature. Jonathan's Space Report. Retrieved on 2007-10-24.
- Menzel, D. H.; Minnaert, M.; Levin, B.; Dollfus, A.; Bell, B. (1971). "Report on Lunar Nomenclature by The Working Group of Commission 17 of the IAU". Space Science Reviews 12: 136.
- Moore, Patrick (2001). On the Moon. Sterling Publishing Co.. ISBN 0-304-35469-4.
- Price, Fred W. (1988). The Moon Observer's Handbook. Cambridge University Press. ISBN 0521335000.
- Rükl, Antonín (1990). Atlas of the Moon. Kalmbach Books. ISBN 0-913135-17-8.
- Webb, Rev. T. W. (1962). Celestial Objects for Common Telescopes, 6th revision, Dover. ISBN 0-486-20917-2.
- Whitaker, Ewen A. (1999). Mapping and Naming the Moon. Cambridge University Press. ISBN 0-521-62248-4.
- Wlasuk, Peter T. (2000). Observing the Moon. Springer. ISBN 1852331933.
