The Nardò Ring is a striking visual feature from space, and astronauts have photographed it several times. The Ring is a race car test track; it is 12.5 kilometers long and steeply banked to reduce the amount of active steering needed by drivers. Although it is a perfect circle, it appears oval in this photograph. This distortion is because the astronaut’s viewing angle was 35 degrees, looking back along the orbit track to the southwest from the International Space Station’s window.
Published Sep 10, 2007
Erosion exposed the subterranean plumbing of an ancient volcano in South Africa.
Published Jul 22, 2015
In eastern Siberia, a perfect circle of rock contrasts with the surrounding topography. The 6-kilometer- (3.7-mile-) wide ring looks like an impact crater, or the caldera of an extinct volcano, but it is neither. Kondyor Massif was formed by the intrusion of igneous, or volcanic, rock that pushed up through overlying layers of sedimentary rock, some of them laid down more than a billion years ago.
Published May 25, 2008
The world’s oldest and largest known impact structure shows some of the most extreme deformation conditions known on Earth.
Published Sep 1, 2018
On May 20, 2008, a deck of clouds over the Pacific Ocean provided an optical display for the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) on NASA’s Aqua satellite. The ring-shaped, rainbow-like phenomenon, known as a glory, appears through the length of the center of this image.
Published Jun 5, 2008
The earliest roots of the autumn holiday may have sprouted on Ireland’s Hill of Ward.
Published Nov 1, 2014
The Aïr Mountains stand out, aesthetically and geologically, from the surrounding low-lying plains to support unique wildlife.
Published Dec 22, 2018
