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
- 18 January 1975
- Named after
- David Kugultinov , (Soviet poet)
- Alternative designations
- 1975 BA 1 · 1941 FM, 1958 DF · 1975 CE, 1978 RM 1
- Minor planet category
- main-belt · Themis
- Observation arc
- 75.44 yr (27,556 days)
- Aphelion
- 3.7113 AU
- Perihelion
- 2.6512 AU
- Semi major axis
- 3.1813 AU
- Orbital period sidereal
- 5.67 yr (2,073 days)
- Mean anomaly
- 180.53 °
- Mean motion
- 0° 10 25.32 / day
- Inclination
- 1.2545°
- Longitude of ascending node
- 42.238°
- Argument of perihelion
- 100.14°
- Dimensions
- 15.10 ± 4.45 km , 20.51 km (calculated) , 21.07 ± 1.77 km , 21.566 ± 0.067 km
- Synodic rotation period
- 8.43 ± 0.02 h , 10 h , 16.850 ± 0.004 h
via Wikipedia infobox
Wikidata facts
- Instance of
- asteroid
- Named after
- David Nikitich Kugultinov
- Followed by
- Q921733
- Follows
- Q921597
- Parent body
- Sun
- Minor-planet group
- asteroid belt
- Diameter
- 21.566
- Orbital period
- 2078.531198446999
Show 17 more facts
- discoverer or inventor
- Lyudmila Chernykh
- site of astronomical discovery
- Crimean Astrophysical Observatory
- provisional designation
- 1978 RM1
- time of discovery or invention
- 1975-01-18
- orbital eccentricity
- 0.1643272761875093
- orbital inclination
- 1.25050837416215
- periapsis
- 2.663636603222062
- apoapsis
- 3.711195379016314
- semi-major axis of an orbit
- 3.187415991119188
- mean anomaly
- 342.7666327869804
- longitude of ascending node
- 42.1852506695575
- absolute magnitude
- 11.89
- argument of periapsis
- 98.72908935968374
- albedo
- 0.083
- rotation period
- 8.43
- time of periapsis
- 2461100.000253907
- epoch
- November 21, 2025
Sources (2)
via Wikidata · CC0
~3 min read
Encyclopedic overview
2296 Kugultinov, provisional designation 1975 BA1, is a carbonaceous Themistian asteroid from the outer region of the asteroid belt, approximately 20 kilometers in diameter.
It was discovered on 18 January 1975, by Russian astronomer Lyudmila Chernykh at the Crimean Astrophysical Observatory on the Crimean peninsula in Nauchnyj, and named after Soviet poet David Nikitich Kugultinov.
Excerpted from Wikipedia’s “Q912717” article, available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 licence.