High Resolution Image of Toutatis Target Name:   Asteroid Toutatis Spacecraft:   Goldstone Deep Space Radar Produced by:   Ostro et al. © 1995 by the AAAS.

• Toutatis

This is a close up of one of the high-resolution images of Toutatis. The image was acquired by using radar carried out at the Goldstone Deep Space Communications Complex in California's Mojave desert. The image reveals two irregularly shaped, cratered objects about 4 and 2.5 kilometers (2.5 and 1.6 miles) in average diameter which are probably in contact with each other. These "contact binaries" may be fairly common since another one, 4769 Castalia, was observed in 1989 when it passed near the Earth. Numerous surface features on Toutatis, including a pair of half-mile-wide craters, side by side, and a series of three prominent ridges -- a type of asteroid mountain range -- are presumed to result from a complex history of impacts. (Image from Ostro et al., Science 270:80-83, 1995--© Copyright 1995 by the AAAS)