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
- K. Reinmuth
- Discovery site
- Heidelberg Obs.
- Discovery date
- 8 January 1937
- Named after
- Margret Braun , (wife of Heinrich Vogt )
- Alternative designations
- 1937 AL · A924 RD
- Minor planet category
- main-belt · ( outer ) , Eos
- Observation arc
- 80.73 yr (29,485 days)
- Aphelion
- 3.3373 AU
- Perihelion
- 2.7030 AU
- Semi major axis
- 3.0202 AU
- Orbital period sidereal
- 5.25 yr (1,917 days)
- Mean anomaly
- 209.01 °
- Mean motion
- 0° 11 16.08 / day
- Inclination
- 10.352°
- Longitude of ascending node
- 170.92°
- Argument of perihelion
- 233.32°
- Dimensions
- 21.083 ± 0.083 km
- Geometric albedo
- 0.145 ± 0.014
via Wikipedia infobox
Wikidata facts
- Instance of
- asteroid
- Followed by
- Q138891
- Follows
- Q138862
- Parent body
- Sun
- Minor-planet group
- asteroid belt
- Diameter
- 21.083
- Orbital period
- 1918.273919158817
Show 17 more facts
- discoverer or inventor
- Karl Wilhelm Reinmuth
- site of astronomical discovery
- Heidelberg-Königstuhl State Observatory
- provisional designation
- A924 RD
- time of discovery or invention
- 1937-01-08
- orbital eccentricity
- 0.108597889120354
- absolute magnitude
- 11.12
- orbital inclination
- 10.35320472814694
- periapsis
- 2.693281750687261
- apoapsis
- 3.349516932007128
- semi-major axis of an orbit
- 3.021399341347195
- mean anomaly
- 52.29701613809865
- longitude of ascending node
- 170.7948473773714
- argument of periapsis
- 233.6982818582728
- albedo
- 0.145
- rotation period
- 13.907
- time of periapsis
- 2460721.833327479
- epoch
- November 21, 2025
Sources (2)
via Wikidata · CC0
~3 min read
Encyclopedic overview
1410 Margret, provisional designation 1937 AL, is an Eoan asteroid from the outer regions of the asteroid belt, approximately 21 kilometers in diameter. It was discovered on 8 January 1937, by astronomer Karl Reinmuth at the Heidelberg Observatory in southwest Germany. The asteroid was named after Margret Braun, wife of the Heidelberg astronomer Heinrich Vogt.
Orbit and classification
Excerpted from Wikipedia’s “Q138877” article, available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 licence.