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Landslide Within a Crater on Ceres

Landslide Within a Crater on Ceres
Landslide Within a Crater on Ceres Dawn took this picture on March 22 from an altitude of 240 miles (385 kilometers). The impact that formed the crater in the upper left deposited material outside the crater, partially covering the smaller craters that were already there. The area on the lower right of the picture, including the other large crater in this scene, has many more small craters and so must be older. Sunlight in this photograph is coming from the right, so all the craters are dark on the right side where their walls descend into shadow. The crater walls on the left face the sun and so are illuminated. Look closely around the young crater and on its floor to see many very small features with the opposite lighting: they are bright on the right and dark on the left. Unlike all the craters, they are not depressions but rather are very large boulders, catching sunlight on the right side. (Each pixel in this picture is 120 feet, or 35 meters.) The tremendous punch that excavated the young crater must have produced these boulders. The Dawn project does not recommend doing the same thing at home. Full image and caption. NASA / JPL-Caltech / UCLA / MPS / DLR / IDA