March 17, 2021
When you were born, the Sun rose on a world that had never seen you before. Since then, every dawn has arrived in a universe subtly altered...
The Surface of Venus from Venera 14
Birthday · March 17, 2021
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APOD published March 17, 2021. Credit: Donald Mitchell. A publication-date match, not a photo taken on your date. Independent of NASA.
If you could stand on Venus -- what would you see? Pictured is the view from Venera 14, a robotic Soviet lander which parachuted and air-braked down through the thick Venusian atmosphere in March of 1982. The desolate landscape it saw included flat rocks, vast empty terrain, and a featureless sky above Phoebe Regio near Venus' equator. On the lower left is the spacecraft's penetrometer used to make scientific measurements, while the light piece on the right is part of an ejected lens-cap. Enduring temperatures near 450 degrees Celsius and pressures 75 times that on Earth, the hardened Venera spacecraft lasted only about an hour. Although data from Venera 14 was beamed across the inner Solar System almost 40 years ago, digital processing and merging of Venera's unusual images continues even today. Recent analyses of infrared measurements taken by ESA's orbiting Venus Express spacecraft indicate that active volcanoes may currently exist on Venus.
Image credit: Donald Mitchell