Petavius
Location: ·
A giant rille slashes straight across its floor — visible for only a few nights after sunrise.
Type
Crater
Diameter
184 km
Position
25.4°S 60.8°E
Name approved
1935
Petavius has been lifted and cracked from below in the same way Gassendi has. Its floor is domed upward, standing higher than the surrounding terrain, and Rima Petavius runs from the central peak complex to the southwestern rim - the largest of a set of fractures opened as the floor rose.
At 184 km across, and with 3.3 km of relief from rim to floor, it is one of the deeper craters of its size, which the foreshortening near the limb tends to disguise.
Sunrise
Sunset
Sunrise and sunset on Petavius
| Event | Time | Lit |
|---|---|---|
| Computing… | ||
- Sunrise / Sunset: at the feature's centre (IAU Gazetteer of Planetary Nomenclature).
- Lit: the illuminated fraction of the Moon's disc at that moment.
Named after
Denis Pétau, latinised Petavius, French chronologist and astronomer (1583–1652).
Further info
Official record from the IAU Gazetteer of Planetary Nomenclature: Petavius
Wikipedia: Petavius (crater)