Fly over the Moon with LRO

The LRO, Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter, probe was launched on 23 June 2009 by NASA in order to study our natural satellite in detail and, at the time, in the prospect of sending astronauts back to its surface (President Barack Obama has since cancelled this project). But, whether the Americans will shortly be walking on lunar soil or not, the richness and accuracy of the data from the robotic explorer can but delight the scientific community. Moreover, NASA’s Goddard Center has just made public, via the Planetary Data System, a first set of measurements and images from the 7 onboard instruments. It totals 55 terabytes; enough to fill 88,000 CD-ROMS!
As a treat for the eyes, the American Space Agency has put together this Moon flyby video using photographs taken by the LRO.

Press release from NASA’s Goddard Center

Image gallery on Flickr

Link to the Planetary Data System

Published on 16 March 2010

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