South Ray (crater)
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South Ray (crater)
South Ray crater is a small crater in the Descartes Highlands of the Moon photographed from the lunar surface by the astronauts of Apollo 16. The name of the crater was formally adopted by the IAU in 1973. The Apollo 16 Lunar Module (LM) ''Orion'' landed between North Ray and South Ray craters on April 21, 1972. The astronauts John Young and Charles Duke explored the area between the craters over the course of three EVAs using a Lunar Roving Vehicle, or rover. They came closest to South Ray on EVA 2, at station 4 ( Cinco crater), about 3.9 km south of the landing site. Duke photographed South Ray from there with a 500-mm lens. South Ray crater is approximately 700 m in diameter and approximately 120 m deep, with a bright system of rays of ejecta. The astronauts observed that the ejecta of South Ray was very bouldery, and reported that it would have been difficult or impossible to drive there on their rover.
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Apollo 16
Apollo 16 (April 1627, 1972) was the tenth crewed mission in the United States Apollo space program, administered by NASA, and the fifth and penultimate to land on the Moon. It was the second of Apollo's " J missions", with an extended stay on the lunar surface, a focus on science, and the use of the Lunar Roving Vehicle (LRV). The landing and exploration were in the Descartes Highlands, a site chosen because some scientists expected it to be an area formed by volcanic action, though this proved to not be the case. The mission was crewed by Commander John Young, Lunar Module Pilot Charles Duke and Command Module Pilot Ken Mattingly. Launched from the Kennedy Space Center in Florida on April 16, 1972, Apollo 16 experienced a number of minor glitches en route to the Moon. These culminated with a problem with the spaceship's main engine that resulted in a six-hour delay in the Moon landing as NASA managers contemplated having the astronauts abort the mission and return to E ...
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South Ray Crater Contour Map P115a
South is one of the cardinal directions or compass points. The direction is the opposite of north and is perpendicular to both east and west. Etymology The word ''south'' comes from Old English ''sūþ'', from earlier Proto-Germanic ''*sunþaz'' ("south"), possibly related to the same Proto-Indo-European root that the word ''sun'' derived from. Some languages describe south in the same way, from the fact that it is the direction of the sun at noon (in the Northern Hemisphere), like Latin meridies 'noon, south' (from medius 'middle' + dies 'day', cf English meridional), while others describe south as the right-hand side of the rising sun, like Biblical Hebrew תֵּימָן teiman 'south' from יָמִין yamin 'right', Aramaic תַּימנַא taymna from יָמִין yamin 'right' and Syriac ܬܰܝܡܢܳܐ taymna from ܝܰܡܝܺܢܳܐ yamina (hence the name of Yemen, the land to the south/right of the Levant). Navigation By convention, the ''bottom or down-facing side'' of a ...
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United States Geological Survey
The United States Geological Survey (USGS), formerly simply known as the Geological Survey, is a scientific agency of the United States government. The scientists of the USGS study the landscape of the United States, its natural resources, and the natural hazards that threaten it. The organization's work spans the disciplines of biology, geography, geology, and hydrology. The USGS is a fact-finding research organization with no regulatory responsibility. The agency was founded on March 3, 1879. The USGS is a bureau of the United States Department of the Interior; it is that department's sole scientific agency. The USGS employs approximately 8,670 people and is headquartered in Reston, Virginia. The USGS also has major offices near Lakewood, Colorado, at the Denver Federal Center, and Menlo Park, California. The current motto of the USGS, in use since August 1997, is "science for a changing world". The agency's previous slogan, adopted on the occasion of its hundredt ...
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Lunar Geologic Timescale
The lunar geological timescale (or selenological timescale) divides the history of Earth's Moon into five generally recognized periods: the Copernican period, Copernican, Eratosthenian, Imbrian (Late Imbrian, Late and Early Imbrian, Early epochs), Nectarian, and Pre-Nectarian. The boundaries of this time scale are related to large impact events that have modified the lunar surface, changes in impact crater, crater formation through time, and the size-frequency distribution of craters superposed on geological units. The absolute ages for these periods have been constrained by radiometric dating of samples obtained from the lunar surface. However, there is still much debate concerning the ages of certain key events, because correlating lunar regolith samples with geological units on the Moon is difficult, and most lunar radiometric ages have been highly affected by an intense history of bombardment. Lunar stratigraphy The primary geological processes that have modified the lunar sur ...
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Ejecta
Ejecta (from the Latin: "things thrown out", singular ejectum) are particles ejected from an area. In volcanology, in particular, the term refers to particles including pyroclastic materials (tephra) that came out of a volcanic explosion and magma eruption volcanic vent, or crater, has traveled through the air or under water, and fell back on the ground surface or on the ocean floor. Volcanology Typically in volcanology, ejecta is a result of explosive eruptions. In an explosive eruption, large amounts of gas are dissolved in extremely viscous lava; this lava froths to the surface until the material is expelled rapidly due to the trapped pressure. Sometimes in such an event a lava plug or volcanic neck forms from lava that solidifies inside a volcano's vent, causing heat and pressure to build up to an extreme with no way to escape. When the blockage breaks and cannot sustain itself any longer, a more violent eruption occurs, which allows materials to be ejected out of the volc ...
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Ray System
A ray system comprises radial streaks of fine '' ejecta'' thrown out during the formation of an impact crater, looking somewhat like many thin spokes coming from the hub of a wheel. The rays may extend for lengths up to several times the diameter of their originating crater, and are often accompanied by small secondary craters formed by larger chunks of ejecta. Ray systems have been identified on the Moon, Earth ( Kamil Crater), Mercury, and some moons of the outer planets. Originally it was thought that they existed only on planets or moons lacking an atmosphere, but more recently they have been identified on Mars in infrared images taken from orbit by '' 2001 Mars Odyssey''s thermal imager. Rays appear at visible, and in some cases infrared wavelengths, when ejecta are made of material with different reflectivity (i.e., albedo) or thermal properties from the surface on which they are deposited. Typically, visible rays have a higher albedo than the surrounding surface. More rarel ...
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South Ray Crater AS14-69-9535
South is one of the cardinal directions or compass points. The direction is the opposite of north and is perpendicular to both east and west. Etymology The word ''south'' comes from Old English ''sūþ'', from earlier Proto-Germanic ''*sunþaz'' ("south"), possibly related to the same Proto-Indo-European root that the word ''sun'' derived from. Some languages describe south in the same way, from the fact that it is the direction of the sun at noon (in the Northern Hemisphere), like Latin meridies 'noon, south' (from medius 'middle' + dies 'day', cf English meridional), while others describe south as the right-hand side of the rising sun, like Biblical Hebrew תֵּימָן teiman 'south' from יָמִין yamin 'right', Aramaic תַּימנַא taymna from יָמִין yamin 'right' and Syriac ܬܰܝܡܢܳܐ taymna from ܝܰܡܝܺܢܳܐ yamina (hence the name of Yemen, the land to the south/right of the Levant). Navigation By convention, the ''bottom or down-facing side'' of a ...
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South Ray Crater AS16-112-18245-18252
South is one of the cardinal directions or compass points. The direction is the opposite of north and is perpendicular to both east and west. Etymology The word ''south'' comes from Old English ''sūþ'', from earlier Proto-Germanic ''*sunþaz'' ("south"), possibly related to the same Proto-Indo-European root that the word ''sun'' derived from. Some languages describe south in the same way, from the fact that it is the direction of the sun at noon (in the Northern Hemisphere), like Latin meridies 'noon, south' (from medius 'middle' + dies 'day', cf English meridional), while others describe south as the right-hand side of the rising sun, like Biblical Hebrew תֵּימָן teiman 'south' from יָמִין yamin 'right', Aramaic תַּימנַא taymna from יָמִין yamin 'right' and Syriac ܬܰܝܡܢܳܐ taymna from ܝܰܡܝܺܢܳܐ yamina (hence the name of Yemen, the land to the south/right of the Levant). Navigation By convention, the ''bottom or down-facing side'' of a ...
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Cinco (crater)
Cinco is a small crater in the Descartes Highlands of the Moon visited by the astronauts of Apollo 16. The crater is one of a group of five (hence the name, Spanish for ''five'') craters that were collectively called the Cinco craters during the Apollo 16 mission. The craters were designated ''a'', ''b'', ''c'', ''d'', and ''e'', and the largest (''a'') was officially named ''Cinco'' after the mission in 1973 by the IAU. On April 21, 1972, the Apollo 16 Apollo Lunar Module ''Orion'' landed about 4 km north of Cinco, northeast of the prominent South Ray crater. The astronauts John Young and Charles Duke explored the area over the course of three EVAs using a Lunar Roving Vehicle, or rover. They drove up Stone Mountain to Station 4, about 80 m west of Cinco crater, on EVA 2. The primary goal of sampling on Stone Mountain was to attempt to sample the Descartes Formation, although it remains unclear if the Descartes was sampled.''To a Rocky Moon: A Geologist's History of L ...
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Descartes Highlands
The Descartes Highlands is an area of lunar highlands located on the near side that served as the landing site of the American Apollo 16 mission in early 1972. The Descartes Highlands is located in the area surrounding Descartes crater, after which the feature received its name. Geology Two major formations dominate the Descartes Highlands area: the Cayley plains and the Descartes formation. The latter is composed primarily of highland plateau material, perhaps debris from large impact events—specifically the impact that formed Mare Nectaris. North Ray and South Ray craters, the former sampled directly by the Apollo 16 crew, revealed a layering sequence, possibly an overlap of the Cayley and Descartes formations. The area of the Descartes Highlands is characterized by an undulating landscape covered with old and some new, sharp rimmed craters. Based upon findings during the Apollo 16 mission, some of the floors of these craters were covered with glass similar to that found a ...
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Lunar Roving Vehicle
The Lunar Roving Vehicle (LRV) is a battery-powered four-wheeled rover used on the Moon in the last three missions of the American Apollo program ( 15, 16, and 17) during 1971 and 1972. It is popularly called the Moon buggy, a play on the term '' dune buggy''. Built by Boeing, each LRV has a mass of without payload. It could carry a maximum payload of , including two astronauts, equipment, and lunar samples, and was designed for a top speed of , although it achieved a top speed of on its last mission, Apollo 17. Each LRV was carried to the Moon folded up in the Lunar Module's Quadrant 1 Bay. After being unpacked, each was driven an average of 30 km, without major incident. These three LRVs remain on the Moon. History The concept of a lunar rover predated Apollo, with a 1952–1954 series in ''Collier's Weekly'' magazine by Wernher von Braun and others, "Man Will Conquer Space Soon!" In this, von Braun described a six-week stay on the Moon, featuring 10-ton tractor trai ...
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Extra-vehicular Activity
Extravehicular activity (EVA) is any activity done by an astronaut in outer space outside a spacecraft. In the absence of a breathable Earthlike atmosphere, the astronaut is completely reliant on a space suit for environmental support. EVA includes ''spacewalks'' and lunar or planetary surface exploration (commonly known from 1969 to 1972 as ''moonwalks''). In a stand-up EVA (SEVA), an astronaut stands through an open hatch but does not fully leave the spacecraft. EVA has been conducted by the Soviet Union/Russia, the United States, Canada, the European Space Agency and China. On March 18, 1965, Alexei Leonov became the first human to perform a spacewalk, exiting the Voskhod 2 capsule for 12 minutes and 9 seconds. On July 20, 1969, Neil Armstrong became the first human to perform a moonwalk, outside his lunar lander on Apollo 11 for 2 hours and 31 minutes. On the last three Moon missions, astronauts also performed deep-space EVAs on the return to Earth, to retrieve film canis ...
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