Planetary Crater Consortium

@planetarycraters.bsky.social

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The PCC is a community organization of planetary scientists interested in impact cratering on solar system bodies (planets, dwarf planets, moons, asteroids, and/or comets), including observational, theoretical, experimental, and numerical modeling studies.

A beautiful layered ejecta crater on Mars with two distinct layers.
Image of a binary asteroid, covered in rubble.
Image of a doublet crater from the Mars Global Surveyor (MGS) Mars Orbiter Camera (MOC). Credit: NASA/JPL/Malin Space Science Systems. Image shows two side by side craters with a straight rim separation and butterfly ejecta.
Meteor Crater, Arizona as seen from above. This image has a resolution of 2 meters per pixel, and illumination is from the right. Layers of exposed kaibab limestone and moenkopi and toroweap sandstone are visible just beneath the crater rim, as well as in the surrounding ejecta blanket, which has large blocks excavated by the impact. The visitor center and associated parking lot are on the north end of the crater. This image was taken by the NASA Earth Observatory
Google earth image showing an outline of the Yarrrabubba impact structure and a map of Australia indicating the location of the impact structure in Western Australia.
Image of an impact crater on Ceres with several bright spots in the interior of the crater.
Images of land features that are in the shape of the letters C R A T E R S
Meteor Crater from the southeast; the uplift around the rim can be seen. USGS/D. Roddy.
This 3D rendering of Orientale shows the terrain in high relief, as it would be just after sunrise. Gravity anomalies measured by the Gravity Recovery and Interior Laboratory (GRAIL) mission are depicted in different colors on the right side of the image. Red indicates areas of higher gravity, or excess mass, and blue indicates lower gravity or areas of mass deficits. The GRAIL data reveals the structure of the basin beneath the surface. The red in the center of the basin, for example, shows that the crust is particularly thin there, and that denser mantle material is closer to the surface. NASA's Scientific Visualization Studio
Simulation of the Orientale impact
The Orientale basin is the youngest of the large lunar basins. The distinct outer ring is about 590 miles (950 km) from east-to-west.
Pedestal crater on Mars, as seen by HiRISE under HiWish program. Top layer has protected the lower material from being eroded. The location is Casius quadrangle.
Map of the overall resource potential of frozen materials in lunar PSRs. North (left) and south (right) pole PSR volatile ranking thematic maps overlaying Diviner Lunar Radiometer Experiment annual maximum bolometric temperature.
English: Shackleton Crater in the Lunar South Pole region, mosaic created by LROC (Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter) and ShadowCam teams.
Erlanger is a very deep lunar impact crater that lies near the north pole of the Moon. Image taken by the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter Narrow Angle Camera.
Image of a large impact crater on the moon with a central peak
Image of an impact crater on the moon surrounded by a bright ejecta blanket
A four panel image showing different impact craters on various solar system bodies
The original PCC team from 2007 stands outside in Flagstaff, AZ.