Asteroid Eros. Photo: JHU/APL

From April through August 2000, the NEAR Shoemaker spacecraft will map Eros in very high spatial resolution from a low altitude. Images, covering the whole asteroid, will show features as small as 4 meters (13 feet) across.

This image, which provides a taste of the exquisite detail to come, was taken April 30, 2000, from an orbital height of 76 kilometers (47 miles). Hours later, an engine firing placed the spacecraft into a 50-kilometer (31-mile) altitude orbit. The image shows features as small as 6 meters (19 feet) across. The whole scene is 3 kilometers (1.8 miles) across.

Built and managed by The Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory, Laurel, Maryland, NEAR-Shoemaker was the first spacecraft launched in NASA's Discovery Program of low-cost, small-scale planetary missions.