Shuttered
through the camera's broadband clear filter as part of a 30-frame mosaic
designed to image the asteroid itself, this frame fortuitously captured
the previously unknown moon at a range of about 3,900 km, just over 4 minutes
before the spacecraft's closest approach to Ida. Each picture element spans
about 39 m on the surface of the moon. |
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More
than a dozen craters larger than 80 m in diameter are clearly evident, indicating
that the moon has suffered numerous collisions from smaller Solar System
debris during its history. The larger crater on the terminator is about
300 m across. The satellite is approximately egg-shaped, measuring about
1.2 x 1.4 x 1.6 km. At the time this image was shuttered, Ida was about
90 km away from the moon. |
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