The pitted surface of Tempel 1

Filed under pretty pictures, comets, comet Tempel 1, Stardust

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This view of the nucleus of comet Tempel 1 is composed of many frames captured from different ranges by Deep Impact's Impactor spacecraft as it approached for its July 4, 2005 encounter. Images of the whole comet nucleus were taken from a greater distance and so are blurrier; highest resolution images were captured of the bottom half of the nucleus. The crash site was between the two circular features at the center of the image, which are thought to be impact craters.

NASA / JPL / UMD

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported License.
Contact us to request publication permission from the copyright holder. Original image data dated on or about July 4, 2005