About 58 minutes before MESSENGER's closest approach to Mercury on Oct. 6, 2008, its Narrow Angle Camera captured this close-up image. The features in the foreground, near the right side of the image, are close to the terminator, the line between the sunlit dayside and dark night side of the planet, making the shadows long and prominent.
About 58 minutes before MESSENGER’s closest approach to Mercury on Oct. 6, 2008, its Narrow Angle Camera captured this close-up image.
The features in the foreground, near the right side of the image, are close to the terminator, the line between the sunlit dayside and dark night side of the planet, making the shadows long and prominent. Two very long scarps, or cliffs, are visible in this region, and the scarps appear to crosscut each other. The easternmost scarp also cuts through a crater, showing that it formed after the impact that created the crater.Image Credit: NASA/Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory/Carnegie Institution of Washington