Image by Pahan on Pixabay · Pixabay License
Picture of the Day · NASA
Pathfinder on Mars
2026-07-04
On July 4th, 1997, using its own array of fireworks, a parachute, and a cocoon of airbags, the Mars Pathfinder spacecraft bounced like a giant beach ball at least 15 times before it came to rest on the surface of Mars at 10:07 AM Pacific Daylight Time. After its then novel airbag-assisted landing sequence was completed, Pathfinder transmitted this color mosaic to mission operators on Earth. In the scene from another world, the Mars Sojourner robot rover is visible in the foreground, crouched on top of the unfolded Pathfinder. About the size of a large house cat, the six-wheeled, solar-powered Sojourner became the first successful Martian rover. Surrounding Pathfinder are deflated airbags and the rock-strewn terrain of the Ares Vallis floodplain. In the distance Martian hills appear against a dusty brownish sky. The Pathfinder lander was subsequently renamed the Carl Sagan Memorial Station.
via NASA APOD
Key facts
- Discovered by
- L. Chernykh
- Discovery site
- Crimean Astrophysical Obs.
- Discovery date
- 6 February 1968
- Named after
- Yuri Gagarin ( cosmonaut )
- Alternative designations
- 1968 CB · 1940 GA, 1942 VZ · 1948 ET, 1960 FH · 1969 OO
- Minor planet category
- main-belt · ( middle )
- Observation arc
- 76.21 yr (27,835 days)
- Aphelion
- 2.7924 AU
- Perihelion
- 2.2610 AU
- Semi major axis
- 2.5267 AU
- Orbital period sidereal
- 4.02 yr (1,467 days)
- Mean anomaly
- 90.345 °
- Mean motion
- 0° 14 43.44 / day
- Inclination
- 5.7423°
- Longitude of ascending node
- 88.181°
- Argument of perihelion
- 93.442°
- Dimensions
- 8.00 km (derived) , 8.838 ± 0.644 , 9.634 ± 0.105 km
- Synodic rotation period
- 10.937 91 ± 0.000 05 h , 10.941 30 ± 0.000 05 h , 10.9430 ± 0.0049 h , 10.96 h
via Wikipedia infobox
Wikidata facts
- Instance of
- asteroid
- Named after
- Yuri Gagarin
- Followed by
- Q143543
- Follows
- 1771 Makover
- Parent body
- Sun
- Minor-planet group
- asteroid belt
- Diameter
- 9.634
- Orbital period
- 1467.752133479652
- Image
- 001772-asteroid shape model (1772) Gagarin.png
Show 18 more facts
- discoverer or inventor
- Lyudmila Chernykh
- site of astronomical discovery
- Crimean Astrophysical Observatory
- provisional designation
- 1969 OO
- time of discovery or invention
- 1968-02-06
- orbital eccentricity
- 0.1047492502808931
- orbital inclination
- 5.742956502859899
- periapsis
- 2.262807219470474
- apoapsis
- 2.792328942505264
- semi-major axis of an orbit
- 2.527568080987869
- mean anomaly
- 104.1264242538465
- longitude of ascending node
- 87.97818204672649
- argument of periapsis
- 95.5006568323974
- absolute magnitude
- 12.68
- Commons category
- 1772 Gagarin
- albedo
- 0.138
- rotation period
- 10.96
- time of periapsis
- 2460575.9672740274
- epoch
- November 21, 2025
Sources (2)
via Wikidata · CC0
~3 min read
Encyclopedic overview
1772 Gagarin (prov. designation: 1968 CB) is a stony background asteroid from the central region of the asteroid belt, approximately 9 kilometers in diameter. It was discovered on 6 February 1968, by Russian astronomer Lyudmila Chernykh at the Crimean Astrophysical Observatory in Nauchnyj, on the Crimean Peninsula. The asteroid was named after cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin.
Orbit and classification
Excerpted from Wikipedia’s “1772 Gagarin” article, available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 licence.