Recovery of Central Peaks Heights for 42 Nearside Lunar Craters after Pike 1976 shown on LTOs

In this author's prior article, I noted that it was possible to recover high-accuracy nearside central-crater peak heights identified by Pike. Fisher 2007a, Pike 1976. These peaks have high accuracy (+- 100 meter) height measurements listed on Apollo-era Lunar Topographic Orthophotomaps (LTOs). Table 1, below, is a follow-up note to Fisher 2007a and contains chart take-offs of the central height of each listed crater identified by Pike. In the process of reviewing the LTOs, four additional craters with central peak heights were located that were not identified by Pike. The high-accuracy height of the central peak of Tycho by Margot et al also is included. Margot et al 1999. For reading convenience, cross-references to Rükl charts and an external content link to an image of the crater are provided. Linked external image content includes the Lunar Picture of the Day, the LPOD companion Coppermine image gallery, and Apollo astronaut and Lunar Orbitor IV imagery archived at the Lunar and Planetary Institute.

The comments column identifies 11 of 42 peaks as potentially suitable for practicing making height measurements by the shadow technique using software features in Jamieson's Lunar Observer's Toolkit or Mosher and Bondo's Lunar Terminator Visualization Tool (LTVT). These central peaks are surrounded at local azimuth 90 or 270 degrees with relatively flat crater floor terrain. The eleven craters are located in a spherical square bounded by meridians at +- 30 degrees lunar longitude and +- 30 degrees lunar latitude.

Methodology involved reviewing LTO charts for the central peak height and a representative crater floor altitude. Altitudes on the LTOs are relative to a lunar sphere radius. The difference between these two altitudes was taken as the central peak height. The representative crater floor altitude also is listed in Table 1.

References

Fisher, K.A. (amateur) 2007a. The Third Dimension: Crater Depths from the Apollo Era to the Present. Selenology Today 5:17-61 URL: http://digilander.libero.it/glrgroup/selenologytoday5.pdf

Pike, R. J. June-July 1976. Crater dimensions from Apollo data and supplemental sources. The Moon. 15:463-477. 1976Moon...15..463P URL: http://adsabs.harvard.edu/cgi-bin/nph-bib_query?bibcode=1976Moon...15..463P

Jamieson, H.D. 1997. Lunar Observer’s Toolkit. URL: http://www.glrgroup.org/download/tool.exe, (last date accessed: 7 Jan. 2007)

Margot, J.L., Campbell, D.B., et al. 1999a. The Topography of Tycho Crater. (Abstract). J. Geo. Res. 104(E5):11875-11882. 1999JGR...10411875M URL: http://adsabs.harvard.edu/cgi-bin/nph-bib_query?bibcode=1999JGR...10411875M

Mosher, Jim and Bondo, Henrik. 2006. Lunar Terminator Visualization Tool (LTVT) (software) URL: http://inet.uni2.dk/~d120588/henrik/jim_ltvt.html

fisherka@csolutions.net