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
- G. Neujmin
- Discovery site
- Simeiz Obs.
- Discovery date
- 16 August 1936
- Named after
- Mikhail Subbotin , (Soviet scientist)
- Alternative designations
- 1936 QD · 1927 SL, 1930 FG · 1931 OA, 1935 GJ · 1935 JJ, 1940 LK · 1941 SO 1 , 1941 UA · 1949 HL 1 , 1950 RZ · 1951 YM 1 , 1955 SO 2 · 1964 RC
- Minor planet category
- main-belt · ( middle ) , background
- Observation arc
- 88.24 yr (32,228 d)
- Aphelion
- 3.1731 AU
- Perihelion
- 2.4012 AU
- Semi major axis
- 2.7871 AU
- Orbital period sidereal
- 4.65 yr (1,700 d)
- Mean anomaly
- 289.80 °
- Mean motion
- 0° 12 42.48 / day
- Inclination
- 2.4273°
- Longitude of ascending node
- 199.66°
- Argument of perihelion
- 111.88°
- Mean diameter
- 36.075 ± 0.380 km , 36.59 ± 1.7 km , 38.11 ± 0.53 km
- Synodic rotation period
- 9.2457 ± 0.0005 h
via Wikipedia infobox
Wikidata facts
- Instance of
- asteroid
- Named after
- Mikhail Subbotin
- Followed by
- Q142457
- Follows
- 1691 Oort
- Parent body
- Sun
- Minor-planet group
- asteroid belt
- Diameter
- 36.075
- Orbital period
- 1699.332439487
Show 19 more facts
- discoverer or inventor
- Grigory Neujmin
- site of astronomical discovery
- Simeiz Observatory
- provisional designation
- 1964 RC
- time of discovery or invention
- 1936-08-16
- orbital eccentricity
- 0.1361765447475263
- orbital inclination
- 2.427082722559078
- periapsis
- 2.407381615394669
- apoapsis
- 3.166399927017959
- semi-major axis of an orbit
- 2.786890771206314
- mean anomaly
- 78.19185072491888
- longitude of ascending node
- 199.5539836358695
- argument of periapsis
- 111.8388098879425
- absolute magnitude
- 11.41
- Commons category
- 1692 Subbotina
- albedo
- 0.049
- rotation period
- 9.2457
- asteroid spectral type
- C-type asteroid
- time of periapsis
- 2460631.4056987767
- epoch
- November 21, 2025
Sources (2)
via Wikidata · CC0
~3 min read
Encyclopedic overview
1692 Subbotina, provisional designation 1936 QD, is a dark background asteroid from the central region of the asteroid belt, approximately 37 kilometers (23 miles) in diameter. The carbonaceous Cg-type asteroid has a rotation period of 9.2 hours. It was discovered by Grigory Neujmin at the Crimean Simeiz Observatory in 1936, and later named after Soviet mathematician and astronomer Mikhail Subbotin.
Discovery
Excerpted from Wikipedia’s “1692 Subbotina” article, available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 licence.