Orbiter returns its first images of moon's surface

A lunar probe that launched last month from Cape Canaveral has returned its first pictures of the moon's surface.

The Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter blasted off on June 18 atop a United Launch Alliance Atlas V rocket, and reached the moon less than five days later.

The spacecraft has been turning on and testing its seven science instruments during a two-month commissioning phase, including wide- and narrow-angle cameras activated June 30.

LRO's yearlong, $511-million mission to create the most detailed maps yet of the moon should start next month.

NASA will use the maps of topography, temperature and minerals to find safe landing sites and interesting areas to explore when astronauts return to the moon, missions planned as early as 2020.

LRO started in an elliptical polar orbit that has brought it as close as 19 miles from the moon's south pole.

It's expected to drop down to a circular polar orbit just 31 miles above the lunar surface next month.

NASA said the orbiter's first images are from a region a few kilometers east of Hell E crater in the lunar highlands south of Mare Nubium, or Sea of Clouds. Both feature impact craters.


"Our first images were taken along the moon's terminator - the dividing line between day and night - making us initially unsure of how they would turn out," Mark Robinson of Arizona State University in Tempe, the principal investigator for the camera instruments, said in a NASA press release.

"Because of the deep shadowing, subtle topography is exaggerated, suggesting a craggy and inhospitable surface. In reality, the area is similar to the region where the Apollo 16 astronauts safely explored in 1972. While these are magnificent in their own right, the main message is that (the camera instrument) is nearly ready to begin its mission."

Each image shows a region a little less than a mile wide, with the bottoms facing lunar north. The image at left shows the images' relative locations.

This picture taken by NASA's Clementine spacecraft in 1994 shows the general area of the photos.

LRO was accompanied for its launch by a secondary payload, called the Lunar Crater Sensing and Observation Satellite, which is still in Earth orbit attached to a rocket stage.

Both are scheduled to smash into a south pole crater on the morning of Oct. 9, hoping to find evidence of water ice.

IMAGES: Click to fully enlarge and save the images. Credit: NASA/Goddard Space Flight Center/Arizona State University.