Posted on 05/24/2015 6:02:16 PM PDT by BenLurkin
The latest image to be revealed of comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko comes from October 27, 2014, before the Philae lander even departed for its surface. Above we get a view of a dramatically-shadowed cliff separating two regions on 67P, the high, smooth plateaus of Babi and the boulder-strewn, slumped valley of Aten. Both are located on the larger lobe of the comet, while parts of the Maat region on the smaller head lobe can be seen in the distance at upper left. (You can see a regional map of comet 67P here.)
The image scale is about 75 cm (2.4 feet) per pixel and the entire image spans 770 meters across about half a mile. Based on that, the cliff is easily over 190 meters (630 feet) high!
Its thought that the morphological differences in the Babi and Aten regions in both texture and altitude are the result of a massive loss of material from Aten at some point in the comets history. According to the entry on the Rosetta blog, the entire volume of the Aten scoop is equivalent to about 50 Great Pyramids of Giza
a fitting analogy considering the choice to name features on 67P with an ancient Egyptian theme
(Excerpt) Read more at universetoday.com ...
“Philae lander”....you can’t make this stuff up.
what range were these images taken from?
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