NSSDC Photo Gallery Asteroids

• Gaspra
• Ida & Dactyl
• Toutatis
• Vesta

Note: If you are looking for images of NEAR's encounter with Mathilde (Asteroid 253), please visit our Mathilde flyby page.

Gaspra

The Galileo spacecraft was the first planetary mission to photograph an asteroid "up-close". Its flyby of Gaspra occurred on 29 October 1991 at a distance of about 16,200 km.

Thumbnail	Image Description	Caption	NASA IDs	Image Size	Hi-Resolution TIFF?
	The asteroid Gaspra.	Caption	P-40450-C	33K
	A montage of images of Gaspra.	Caption	P-41383	75K
	A comparison of Gaspra with Mars' two satellites, Phobos and Deimos.	Caption	P-41382	82K

Ida & Dactyl

The second of the two asteroids which Galileo encountered en route to Jupiter, Ida was discovered to have something different: its own satellite! Galileo's flyby of Ida (and its moon Dactyl) occurred on 28 August 1993 at a distance of about 2,400 km.

Thumbnail	Image Description	Caption	NASA IDs	Image Size	Hi-Resolution TIFF?
	The asteroid Ida.	Caption	P-42964	41K
	The asteroid Ida and its moon, Dactyl.	Caption	P-43731	22K	Hi-res
	The asteroid Ida and its moon, Dactyl (in color).			16K
	The asteroid Ida and its moon, Dactyl (in false color).	Caption	P-44131	21K
	A montage of images of Ida.	Caption	P-44129	38K
	A high-resolution image of the asteroid Ida.	Caption	P-44130	15K
	A close-up picture of Ida's moon, Dactyl.	Caption	P-44297	15K

Toutatis

Thumbnail	Image Description	Caption	NASA IDs	Image Size	Hi-Resolution TIFF?
	Radar images of the asteroid Toutatis obtained with NASA's 70 m radio telescope at Goldstone.	Caption	P-41525	26K

Vesta

Thumbnail	Image Description	Caption	NASA IDs	Image Size	Hi-Resolution TIFF?
	Montage of images of the asteroid Vesta taken by the Hubble Space Telescope using the Wide-Field Planetary Camera 2.	Caption	STScI-PRC95-20A	33K
	Image, elevation map, and model Vesta's surface.	Caption	STScI-PRC97-27	34K	Hi-res

For further information:

• About the Galileo missions
• About the Hubble Space Telescope
• About the NEAR mission

• Mathilde (Asteroid 253) flyby page
• How Dactyl got its name.

• Asteroid Fact Sheet
• Frequently Asked Questions about asteroids
• NSSDC's Asteroid page

Author/curator: Dr. Edwin V. Bell, II NSSDC, Mail Code 690.1 NASA Goddard Space Flight Center Greenbelt, MD 20771 +1-301-286-1187 ed.bell@gsfc.nasa.gov

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