File:573Recha_(Lightcurve_Inversion).png · Wikimedia Commons · See Wikimedia Commons
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
- M. F. Wolf
- Discovery site
- Heidelberg
- Discovery date
- 19 September 1905
- Pronunciation
- / ˈ r iː k ə / , German: [ ˈʁeːçaː ]
- Alternative designations
- 1905 RC
- Observation arc
- 110.43 yr (40335 d)
- Aphelion
- 3.3562 AU (502.08 Gm )
- Perihelion
- 2.6689 AU (399.26 Gm)
- Semi major axis
- 3.0125 AU (450.66 Gm)
- Orbital period sidereal
- 5.23 yr (1909.8 d )
- Mean anomaly
- 55.621 °
- Mean motion
- 0° 11 18.6 / day
- Inclination
- 9.8334°
- Longitude of ascending node
- 342.959°
- Argument of perihelion
- 28.910°
- Mean radius
- 24.00 ± 1.9 km
- Synodic rotation period
- 7.15 h , 7.16633 h (0.298597 d )
- Geometric albedo
- 0.1109 ± 0.020
via Wikipedia infobox
~2 min read
Encyclopedic overview
573 Recha is a minor planet, specifically an asteroid orbiting in the asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter. The asteroid, discovered by German astronomer Max Wolf on September 19, 1905, was named after a character in Gotthold Ephraim Lessing's play Nathan the Wise and may have been inspired by the asteroid's provisional designation 1905 RC.
Photometric observations at the Palmer Divide Observatory in Colorado Springs, Colorado from 2001 to 2006 were used to build a light curve for this object. The asteroid displayed a rotation period of 7.15 ± 0.01 hours and a brightness variation of 0.20 ± 0.02 in magnitude.
Excerpted from Wikipedia’s “Q155627” article, available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 licence.