NASA releases new asteroid flyover movie

April 21, 2000
Web posted at: 3:26 PM EDT (1926 GMT)

By Richard Stenger
CNN Interactive Staff Writer

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LAUREL, Maryland (CNN) -- The NEAR Shoemaker has directed a four-movie marathon, all starring an asteroid it orbits millions of miles from Earth. NEAR scientists released the first of the new flyby films of the potato-shaped space rock on Friday.

"It's a whole new set of images, showing one of the ends of the asteroid," said project scientist Andrew Cheng. "Notice that nice, really weird ridge coming up there," he said, looking at the first movie, shot in mid-March from a distance of about 200 km (125 miles).

Cheng and fellow scientists at the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Lab have good reason to watch closely. They are searching the asteroid Eros' grooves, craters and contours to determine how it evolved into a pockmarked and ridge-laden rock about twice the size of Manhattan.

The latest images of Eros include a closeup revealing ridges and boulders (top); and a new angle on the large indention known as "the saddle"

Each part of the asteroid was filmed under changing lighting conditions to highlight surface features. The first movie shows an end of the asteroid sculpted by linear grooves and riddled with craters and boulders about 50 meters (165 feet) in size.

NEAR scientists studying the alignment of grooves and other features theorize that a number of separate geologic processes took place on the asteroid.

"Things happened to change the structure and composition of the surface. The big question is, which of these happened when it was in its present form, and which happened when it was part of its parent body?" Cheng said.

"It's a wild idea. No one ever thought we would see this much geological activity on an asteroid."

The Laurel, Maryland-based lab plans to release the other movies over the coming days, Cheng said. NEAR (Near Earth Asteroid Rendezvous) Shoemaker has shot several other films since it began orbiting Eros on February 14.

Since becoming the first manmade satellite around an asteroid, NEAR Shoemaker has dropped to increasingly lower orbits. After NEAR Shoemaker fires its thrusters on April 22, it will descend until it reaches a 31 mile (50 km) orbit on April 30. That distance marks the "prime scientific orbit" for the spacecraft, according to Cheng.

At the end of its yearlong study in 2001, mission managers may attempt to briefly land the spacecraft on the surface. NEAR Shoemaker and Eros are roughly 128 million miles (206 million km) from Earth.

Spacecraft moves within 62 miles of asteroid
April 14, 2000
NEAR spacecraft dips closer to asteroid
April 3, 2000
NASA releases 2nd movie of asteroid Eros
March 27, 2000
Asteroid orbiter returns bounty of data, images
March 14, 2000
NEAR tightens orbit, beams asteroid with laser
March 3, 2000

Near Earth Asteroid Rendezvous Mission
NASA Homepage
John Hopkin's Applied Physics Laboratory

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