PIA11770: 2008: Looking Back at the Year with MESSENGER Images
 Target Name:  Mercury
 Is a satellite of:  Sol (our sun)
 Mission:  MESSENGER
 Spacecraft:  MESSENGER
 Instrument:  MDIS - Narrow Angle
MDIS - Wide Angle
 Product Size:  1820 x 2460 pixels (w x h)
 Produced By:  Johns Hopkins University/APL
 Full-Res TIFF:  PIA11770.tif (13.45 MB)
 Full-Res JPEG:  PIA11770.jpg (685.1 kB)

Click on the image above to download a moderately sized image in JPEG format (possibly reduced in size from original)

Original Caption Released with Image:

The year 2008 has been an eventful and historic one for both the MESSENGER mission and Mercury science. When 2008 began, only 45% of Mercury surface had been seen by spacecraft. Then in 2008, the MESSENGER mission flew by Mercury twice, first on January 14 and again on October 6, capturing images of previously unseen terrain. Now, as 2008 comes to its end, imaging coverage of Mercury’s surface is about 90%. The MESSENGER mission still has much to look forward to, with a third Mercury flyby in 2009 and orbiting Mercury beginning in 2011. But for the moment, let’s reflect back on 2008, with the help of 12 MESSENGER images:

These images are from MESSENGER, a NASA Discovery mission to conduct the first orbital study of the innermost planet, Mercury. For information regarding the use of images, see the MESSENGER image use policy.

Image Credit:
NASA/Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory/Carnegie Institution of Washington

Image Addition Date:
2008-12-23