Mercury Up Close

MESSENGER’s mission came to a crashing end yesterday, April 30, on the surface of Mercury, but during its 11 year mission it took the best images of the inner-most planet we’ve seen. This is an enhanced-color mosaic of the Caloris basin, which has been flooded by lava, seen in orange here.

NASA/Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory/Carnegie Institution of Washington

May 1, 2015