The Moon

(Above) A northern section of the lunar surface. The dark floored crater at the upper left is Plato. It is about
60 miles in diameter. Just to its right the "Alpine Valley" is visible. (The flat top on this image is
simply the edge of the field of the camera - no fear, the Moon is almost perfectly spherical.)

The image above shows a southern section of the lunar surface. The large crater at the lower left (that contains many smaller craters) is Clavius. Above Clavius and slightly to the left is the centrally peaked Tycho. Isn't it strange that there are no elliptical craters!  If these are all created by impacts, at least some of them should be elliptical - but they are all almost perfectly circular - WHY?

The image below shows the Mare Imbrium region. The dark flat crater at the top is Plato. The Alpine Valley is just visible (in semi shadow) to Plato's right.

For all three of these images:

Camera:       SBIG ST-237A
Telescope:   Meade 8" LX200 f/6.3.
Exposure:     Set for 0 sec (Defaults to the fastest speed of the ST-237A)
Filter:             Green
Processed:   No dark frames, nor flats were used.
Date:             20 May 2002.

 

© Don Scott

The Holin A. Grotch Observatory