See Mercury’s frigid north pole in extraordinary new images from the BepiColombo spacecraft
A joint Japanese-European mission to Mercury just made its sixth flyby of the planet, revealing stunning close-ups of the permanently shadowed craters at Mercury’s north pole.
New photos of Mercury’s mysterious north pole reveal a glimpse of the permanently dark, frigid craters that may hold ice dozens of feet thick, even though Mercury is the closest planet to the sun.
Mercury’s surface can reach a blistering 800 degrees Fahrenheit (430 degrees Celsius) during the day, according to NASA. But the planet lacks an atmosphere to hold that heat in — so, on Mercury, dark equals cold. At night, temperatures can plunge to minus 290 F (minus 180 C). The planet’s north pole is pockmarked by craters whose bottoms are always in shadow. Research has shown that these crater bottoms likely contain thick deposits of water ice.The new images of these cold craters come courtesy of BepiColombo, a joint mission of the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency and the European Space Agency (ESA). The BepiColombo spacecraft will start orbiting Mercury in 2026. Right now, it’s conducting a series of flybys of the planet to get into position for that orbit. On Jan. 8, one of those flybys brought the craft within 183 miles (295 kilometers) of the planet’s surface. BepiColombo also passed right over Mercury’s north pole.
Lands of perpetual shadow
The spacecraft sent back a series of stark images, including photos of the perpetually shadowed Prokofiev, Kandinsky, Tolkien and Gordimer craters. It also snapped photos of Borealis Planitia, where massive lava flows 3.7 billion years ago created a smooth plain, according to ESA. The pictures show Mercury’s biggest impact crater, as well as a mysterious, boomerang-shaped lava flow.
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Ancient lava deposits form bright patches on Mercury’s surface.
