NASA's MESSENGER spacecraft (MErcury Surface, Space Environment, GEochemistry and Ranging) passed by Mercury for the first time on Jan. 14th. Over 1,200 images were collected, revealing huge cliffs and impact craters. The images are the first collected since the Mariner 10's third and final flyby on March 16, 1975. This time around many new images were captured, including a unique feature dubbed "The Spider." Found in the middle of a huge impact crater, the Caloris Basin, the Spider consists of more than 100 narrow troughs radiating from a complex central region. Nothing like this has ever been seen before on Mercury or the Moon. There are two more flybys scheduled as well as an intensive orbital mission.
http://www.astronomy.com/asy/default.aspx?c=a&id=6536
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