Plato (crater)

1010

The lunar crater Plato is on the near side of the Moon. It is located in the Montes Alpes ( Alps mountains) at 51 ° 40 'North and 9 ° 20' West and has a diameter of 101 km. Its depth is about 1,000 m, the crater rim rises some 2,400 m over the dark crater floor.

Similar to the Mary of the crater floor is covered with formerly liquid basalt. The rim is slipped on the west side for a distance of about 15 km inwards slightly. Its age is estimated at 3.2 to 3.8 billion years. Inside the crater there are 4 more craters with diameters up to about 2 km. These are often used for quality determination of larger amateur telescopes.