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
- N. Chernykh
- Discovery site
- Crimean Astrophysical Obs.
- Discovery date
- 19 July 1977
- Named after
- Apollo–Soyuz (Test Project)
- Alternative designations
- 1977 OH · 1933 SK 1 , 1952 DT 1 · 1963 DD, 1973 YN 3
- Minor planet category
- main-belt · Themis
- Observation arc
- 53.75 yr (19,632 days)
- Aphelion
- 3.7135 AU
- Perihelion
- 2.5605 AU
- Semi major axis
- 3.1370 AU
- Orbital period sidereal
- 5.56 yr (2,029 days)
- Mean anomaly
- 341.70 °
- Mean motion
- 0° 10 38.64 / day
- Inclination
- 1.9888°
- Longitude of ascending node
- 140.40°
- Argument of perihelion
- 285.71°
- Dimensions
- 23.55 km (calculated) , 26.080 ± 0.295 km , 28.26 ± 0.49 km
- Synodic rotation period
- 5.3846 ± 0.0007 h , 5.3868 ± 0.0013 h , 5.4 ± 0.05 h , 6.12 h
via Wikipedia infobox
Wikidata facts
- Diameter
- 26.08
- Orbital period
- 2033.941131066306
Show 14 more facts
- provisional designation
- 1977 OH
- time of discovery or invention
- 1977-07-19
- orbital eccentricity
- 0.1790390006545533
- longitude of ascending node
- 140.3439027017493
- argument of periapsis
- 284.7274675842099
- absolute magnitude
- 11.59
- mean anomaly
- 154.3954125375366
- orbital inclination
- 1.990129626074829
- periapsis
- 2.57918499762035
- apoapsis
- 3.704146365688595
- semi-major axis of an orbit
- 3.141665681654472
- albedo
- 0.113
- rotation period
- 5.388
- time of periapsis
- 2460128.1911666445
Sources (3)
via Wikidata · CC0
~2 min read
Article
2228 Soyuz–Apollo, provisional designation 1977 OH, is a carbonaceous Themistian asteroid from the outer region of the asteroid belt, approximately 26 kilometers in diameter. It was discovered on 19 July 1977, by Soviet–Russian astronomer Nikolai Chernykh at the Crimean Astrophysical Observatory in Nauchnyj on the Crimean peninsula. It was named after the Apollo–Soyuz Test Project.
Orbit and classification