File:000784-asteroid_shape_model_(784)_Pickeringia.png · Wikimedia Commons · See Wikimedia Commons
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
- J. H. Metcalf
- Discovery site
- Winchester Obs. ( 799 )
- Discovery date
- 20 March 1914
- Named after
- Edward Charles Pickering William Henry Pickering (American astronomers)
- Alternative designations
- A914 FC · 1914 UM
- Minor planet category
- main-belt · ( outer ) background
- Observation arc
- 105.82 yr (38,652 d)
- Aphelion
- 3.8458 AU
- Perihelion
- 2.3455 AU
- Semi major axis
- 3.0956 AU
- Orbital period sidereal
- 5.45 yr (1,989 d)
- Mean anomaly
- 97.354 °
- Mean motion
- 0° 10 51.6 / day
- Inclination
- 12.284°
- Longitude of ascending node
- 14.917°
- Argument of perihelion
- 238.01°
- Mean diameter
- 74.89 ± 0.92 km 75.596 ± 0.311 km 89.42 ± 3.4 km
- Mass
- (3.74 ± 0.32) × 10 kg
via Wikipedia infobox
Wikidata facts
- Diameter
- 75.596
- Orbital period
- 1991.637420255386
Show 15 more facts
- provisional designation
- A914 FC
- time of discovery or invention
- 1914-03-20
- orbital inclination
- 12.28058536131154
- Commons category
- 784 Pickeringia
- albedo
- 0.086
- rotation period
- 13.169
- absolute magnitude
- 9.3
- orbital eccentricity
- 0.2409271176963992
- semi-major axis of an orbit
- 3.097951162682793
- periapsis
- 2.351570718293419
- apoapsis
- 3.844331607072167
- longitude of ascending node
- 14.88784254605584
- argument of periapsis
- 237.7759048708838
- mean anomaly
- 99.08252751736835
- time of periapsis
- 2460452.343140286
Sources (2)
via Wikidata · CC0
~5 min read
Article
784 Pickeringia (prov. designation: A914 FC or 1914 UM) is a large background asteroid, approximately 76 kilometers (47 miles) in diameter, located in the outer region of the asteroid belt. It was discovered on 20 March 1914, by American astronomer Joel Hastings Metcalf at the Winchester Observatory (799) in Massachusetts. The dark C-type asteroid has a rotation period of 13.1 hours and an irregular shape. It was named after American astronomers Edward Charles Pickering (1846–1919) and his brother William Henry Pickering (1858–1938).
Orbit and classification