MOON TOUR
SCHILLER
To start off the New Year, spot one of the strangest shaped craters on the Moon
© NASA
TOP TIP!
As with all features on the Moon, your best views of Schiller will be on evenings when it is close to the terminator and illuminated from a low angle.
Ask someone to draw a picture of the Moon with craters, and those craters will likely be round. That’s also how we see the Moon’s largest craters through binoculars and telescopes – round holes blasted out of its rocky surface millions or even billions of years ago by chunks of space rock. An internet search for ‘lunar craters’ will quickly fill your screen with stunning photos of the Moon’s rugged surface pockmarked and scattershot with round craters. But dig a little deeper, straying from the well-trodden tourist path that takes in all the famous craters, and you’ll find a handful of lunar craters that aren’t round. In fact, they’re downright strange.