Bepicolombo spacecraft of the European Space Agency has taken amazing pictures of the planet Mercury. It was flying only a few hundred kilometers above the planet. It has taken pictures of the planet’s North Pole where icy craters are visible. Their floors are covered with permanent shade while infinite plains on the surface can be seen shining in sunlight.
Joseph Ashbaiker, Director General of European Space Agency, released these pictures during a press conference on Thursday. According to ESA, the water accumulated in the dark crater clicked by the Monitoring Camera 1 (M-Cam 1) of Bepicolombo may be present. These craters are known as the coldest craters in the solar system, even though Mercury is the closest to the Sun. The spacecraft will find out whether the water accumulated there is really there. But this will be discovered in 2026 when it will enter its orbit.
A little bigger than our own moon, Mercury planet revolves very close to the Sun. It revolves around an average distance of about 58 million kilometers. During Mercury’s stay in orbit, Bepicolombo has to find out why there is only a thin layer of rocks on the planet, while the planet has a very large iron core, which is 60 percent of its mass.
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