Apollo (crater)

Apollo (crater)

Coordinates	36°06′S 151°48′W / 36.1°S 151.8°W / -36.1; -151.8Coordinates: 36°06′S 151°48′W / 36.1°S 151.8°W / -36.1; -151.8
Diameter	537 km[1]
Colongitude	161° at sunrise
Eponym	Project Apollo

Apollo is an enormous impact crater located in the southern hemisphere on the far side of the Moon. This formation dwarfs the large crater Oppenheimer that is located next to the western rim. The crater Barringer lies across the northern wall. To the southeast is the crater Anders, and Kleymenov is just to the east of the rim.

Apollo is a double-ringed walled plain whose inner ring is roughly half the diameter of the outer wall. Both the outer wall and the interior have been heavily worn and eroded by subsequent impacts, so that significant parts of the outer and inner walls now consist of irregular and incised sections of mountainous arcs.

The interior floor is covered in a multitude of craters of various sizes. Several of the more notable craters have received names. The IAU used the eponyms of people associated with the Apollo program when designating some of these formations.

Sections of Apollo's interior have been resurfaced with lava, leaving patches of the floor with a lower albedo than the surroundings. There is a large patch of this lunar mare in the middle part of the inner ring, which contains some ray system markings. A long stretch of the mare lies along the southern part of the crater. There is also a smaller section near the western rim.

Interior craters

Several craters within the Apollo impact have been named to honor deceased NASA employees.

Dryden is attached to the west-northwestern exterior of the inner ring. Chaffee is a similar-sized crater that lies partly across the southwest section of the inner ring. In the southeast part of the outer crater is Borman. Inside the inner ring are the craters Resnik, McAuliffe, and Onizuka, and the Jarvis–McNair crater pair. The crater Smith lies across the northern part of the inner ring.

In 2006 the IAU approved a proposal to name seven interior craters to honor the astronauts of the Space Shuttle Columbia.^[2][3]

Crater	Coordinates	Diameter	Name source
Chawla	42°48′S 147°30′W / 42.8°S 147.5°W / -42.8; -147.5	15 km	Kalpana Chawla
D. Brown	42°00′S 147°12′W / 42.0°S 147.2°W / -42.0; -147.2	15 km	David McD. Brown
Husband	40°48′S 147°54′W / 40.8°S 147.9°W / -40.8; -147.9	29 km	Richard D. Husband
L. Clark	43°42′S 147°42′W / 43.7°S 147.7°W / -43.7; -147.7	16 km	Laurel B. S. Clark
McCool	41°42′S 146°18′W / 41.7°S 146.3°W / -41.7; -146.3	21 km	William C. McCool
M. Anderson	41°36′S 149°00′W / 41.6°S 149.0°W / -41.6; -149.0	17 km	Michael P. Anderson
Ramon	41°36′S 148°06′W / 41.6°S 148.1°W / -41.6; -148.1	17 km	Ilan Ramon

Three of the crater names include the respective astronaut's first initials to distinguish them from the existing craters called Anderson, Brown and Clark.

References

1. ^ Don E. Wilhelms and Charles J. Byrne (23 January 2009). "Stratigraphy of Lunar Craters". http://www.imageagain.com/Strata/StratigraphyCraters.2.0.htm. 
2. ^ Blue, Jennifer (2006-07-27). "Names for the Columbia astronauts provisionally approved". USGS Astrogeology. http://astrogeology.usgs.gov/HotTopics/index.php?/archives/147-Names-for-the-Columbia-astronauts-provisionally-approved.html. Retrieved 2006-06-08. 
3. ^ Blue, Jennifer (2006-08-30). "Provisional Names Approved". USGS. http://astrogeology.usgs.gov/HotTopics/index.php?/archives/203-Provisional-Names-Approved.html. Retrieved 2007-05-07. 

• Andersson, L. E.; Whitaker, E. A., (1982). NASA Catalogue of Lunar Nomenclature. NASA RP-1097. 
• Blue, Jennifer (July 25, 2007). "Gazetteer of Planetary Nomenclature". USGS. http://planetarynames.wr.usgs.gov/. Retrieved 2007-08-05. 
• Bussey, B.; Spudis, P. (2004). The Clementine Atlas of the Moon. New York: Cambridge University Press. ISBN 0-521-81528-2. 
• Cocks, Elijah E.; Cocks, Josiah C. (1995). Who's Who on the Moon: A Biographical Dictionary of Lunar Nomenclature. Tudor Publishers. ISBN 0-936389-27-3. 
• McDowell, Jonathan (July 15, 2007). "Lunar Nomenclature". Jonathan's Space Report. http://host.planet4589.org/astro/lunar/. Retrieved 2007-10-24. 
• Menzel, D. H.; Minnaert, M.; Levin, B.; Dollfus, A.; Bell, B. (1971). "Report on Lunar Nomenclature by the Working Group of Commission 17 of the IAU". Space Science Reviews 12 (2): 136–186. Bibcode 1971SSRv...12..136M. doi:10.1007/BF00171763.  edit
• Moore, Patrick (2001). On the Moon. Sterling Publishing Co. ISBN 0-304-35469-4. 
• Price, Fred W. (1988). The Moon Observer's Handbook. Cambridge University Press. ISBN 0-521-33500-0. 
• Rükl, Antonín (1990). Atlas of the Moon. Kalmbach Books. ISBN 0-913135-17-8. 
• Webb, Rev. T. W. (1962). Celestial Objects for Common Telescopes (6th revision ed.). Dover. ISBN 0-486-20917-2. 
• Whitaker, Ewen A. (1999). Mapping and Naming the Moon. Cambridge University Press. ISBN 0-521-62248-4. 
• Wlasuk, Peter T. (2000). Observing the Moon. Springer. ISBN 1-85233-193-3. 

External links

• Photo of the lunar crater Apollo from Google Moon