A NASA Discovery mission to conduct the first orbital study of the innermost planet
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MESSENGER

Mission News

June 7, 2013
IAU Approves New Names for Ten Major Fault Scarps on Mercury
The International Astronomical Union (IAU) recently approved a proposal from the MESSENGER Science Team to assign names to 10 rupes, the long cliff-like escarpments that formed over major faults along which one large block of crust on Mercury was thrust up and over another. The IAU has been the arbiter of planetary and satellite nomenclature since its inception in 1919. In keeping with the established naming theme for rupes on Mercury, all of the newly designated features are named after ships of discovery. [more]

Mission Elapsed Time
August 3, 2004
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Mercury Orbit Insertion
March 18, 2011
00:45 UTC
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Day Spot 1a Day Spot 1 Day Spot 2 Day Spot 3
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Countdown to Insertion Burn
Orbits Around Mercury
Orbits completed: 

Time until start of next orbit (hh:mm:ss): 
Orbit start is at maximum altitude.

Featured Images

June 19, 2013
Fiery Yellow, Scattered Blue
June 18, 2013
It's Not Mt. Fuji ...
June 17, 2013
Look, It's a Sublimation Formation!
June 14, 2013
Kertész Shines Bright Like a Diamond
June 13, 2013
Degas' Close Up