Venera 10 landed in the area shown here at two scales - at left a map spanning 500 km shows major landforms, at right, full Magellan resolution gives us details of part of the landing ellipse. We see mixed geology - the dark areas are smooth (ish) plains, probably sediments blown around by the wind. What makes sediment on Venus? Impacts, chemical weathering and maybe volcanic ash. A big bright area (Hyndla Regio) is an upland cut by many faults.
#venus #venera10
Here is an old Soviet version of the Venera 10 image, a bit too contrasty so details get lost especially at the horizon. But what we see is different from Venera 9's boulders. This is a nearly flat area with platy slabs of rock interspersed with darker gravelly soil. One of the rocky slabs is cracked. The two objects are a densitometer to measure surface hardness and a lens cover ejected from the camera after landing.
#venus #venera10
We have seen the Venera 9 and 10 panoramas, but take a look at this from the Planetary Society:
https://www.planetary.org/space-images/rectified-vs-original-venera-9-and-10-panoramas
(presented without any explanation on that page). This version has more detail:
https://www.planetary.org/space-images/standing-on-venus-with-venera-10
These are artistic re-workings of the panoramas, rearranging bits of the images to create a more understandable view. I show them because they pop up in image searches and are often misrepresented as original images.
#venus #venera10
OK, what did Venera 10 see? This is the link I gave earlier to Don Mitchell's page about Venus images:
http://mentallandscape.com/C_CatalogVenus.htm
and here is the raw Venera 10 image:
http://mentallandscape.com/C_Venera10.jpg
His expert processing gives us this:
http://mentallandscape.com/C_Venera10_Processed.jpg
(raw, gaps filled from second image, remaining gaps filled by interpolation)
Both of these Venera landers carried a second camera on the opposite side of the lander, but in each case it failed to operate.
#venus #venera10
Here is an old Soviet version of the Venera 10 image, a bit too contrasty so details get lost especially at the horizon. But what we see is different from Venera 9's boulders. This is a nearly flat area with platy slabs of rock interspersed with darker gravelly soil. One of the rocky slabs is cracked. The two objects are a densitometer to measure surface hardness and a lens cover ejected from the camera after landing.
#venus #venera10
OK, what did Venera 10 see? This is the link I gave earlier to Don Mitchell's page about Venus images:
http://mentallandscape.com/C_CatalogVenus.htm
and here is the raw Venera 10 image:
http://mentallandscape.com/C_Venera10.jpg
His expert processing gives us this:
http://mentallandscape.com/C_Venera10_Processed.jpg
(raw, gaps filled from second image, remaining gaps filled by interpolation)
Both of these Venera landers carried a second camera on the opposite side of the lander, but in each case it failed to operate.
#venus #venera10
The south part of the map contains a large volcanic shield (Samodiva Mons) which has released lava flows showing up as brighter lobate markings extending north and east from the shield. The 300 km circle is the landing location - it could be anywhere in there. The closeup, 100 km wide, shows the plains cut by ridges (east-west) and fractures (north-south). The bright hills are cut by many fractures. Little domes at the left edge are small volcanoes. What did Venera 10 land on?
#venus #venera10
Venera 10 landed in the area shown here at two scales - at left a map spanning 500 km shows major landforms, at right, full Magellan resolution gives us details of part of the landing ellipse. We see mixed geology - the dark areas are smooth (ish) plains, probably sediments blown around by the wind. What makes sediment on Venus? Impacts, chemical weathering and maybe volcanic ash. A big bright area (Hyndla Regio) is an upland cut by many faults.
#venus #venera10
The south part of the map contains a large volcanic shield (Samodiva Mons) which has released lava flows showing up as brighter lobate markings extending north and east from the shield. The 300 km circle is the landing location - it could be anywhere in there. The closeup, 100 km wide, shows the plains cut by ridges (east-west) and fractures (north-south). The bright hills are cut by many fractures. Little domes at the left edge are small volcanoes. What did Venera 10 land on?
#venus #venera10
Venera 10 landed in the area shown here at two scales - at left a map spanning 500 km shows major landforms, at right, full Magellan resolution gives us details of part of the landing ellipse. We see mixed geology - the dark areas are smooth (ish) plains, probably sediments blown around by the wind. What makes sediment on Venus? Impacts, chemical weathering and maybe volcanic ash. A big bright area (Hyndla Regio) is an upland cut by many faults.
#venus #venera10
Venera 10 launched 6 days after V9 (14 June '75) and landed 3 days after its sibling (25 October). This map shows the area. Like Venera 9 it was east of Beta Regio, but 1500 km further south. As with all landers so far the target was essentially unknown, only seen in very low resolution radar reflectivity images from Earth. Here we see a landscape of bright (rough) and dark (smoother) features, which we will see closer tomorrow.
#venus #venera10