Harpalus is a young lunar

Moon

The Moon is Earth's only known natural satellite,There are a number of near-Earth asteroids including 3753 Cruithne that are co-orbital with Earth: their orbits bring them close to Earth for periods of time but then alter in the long term . These are quasi-satellites and not true moons. For more...

 impact crater

Impact crater

In the broadest sense, the term impact crater can be applied to any depression, natural or manmade, resulting from the high velocity impact of a projectile with a larger body...

 that lies on the Mare Frigoris

Mare Frigoris

Mare Frigoris is a lunar mare located just north of Mare Imbrium, and stretches east to north of Mare Serenitatis. The mare is in the outer rings of the Procellarum basin...

, at the eastern edge of the Sinus Roris

Sinus Roris

Sinus Roris is an extension of the northern edge of Oceanus Procellarum on the Moon. The IAU-defined selenographic coordinates of this bay are 54.0° N, 56.6° W, and the diameter is 202 km....

. To the southeast at the edge of the mare

Lunar mare

The lunar maria are large, dark, basaltic plains on Earth's Moon, formed by ancient volcanic eruptions. They were dubbed maria, Latin for "seas", by early astronomers who mistook them for actual seas. They are less reflective than the "highlands" as a result of their iron-rich compositions, and...

 is the small crater Foucault

Foucault (crater)

Foucault is a small lunar impact crater that lies along the southern edge of Mare Frigoris, to the southeast of the crater Harpalus. In the rugged terrain to the south of Foucault is Sharp. The outer perimeter of Foucault forms a somewhat irregular circle, with slight outward bulges to the south...

, and to the northwest on the opposite edge is the walled plain named South

South (lunar crater)

South is a large lunar crater that is located in the northwest part of the Moon. Most of the southern wall of this crater is joined to the Sinus Roris bay of the Oceanus Procellarum, with the southeast rim facing Mare Frigoris. Attached to the northwest of the formation is the larger walled plain...

.

The rim of Harpalus is sharp-edged with little sign of wear or erosion. It is surrounded by an outer rampart of ejecta, most notably towards the north, and is at the center of a small ray system

Ray system

A ray system comprises radial streaks of fine ejecta thrown out during the formation of an impact crater, looking a bit like many thin spokes coming from the hub of a wheel. The rays can extend for lengths up to several times the diameter of their originating crater, and are often accompanied by...

. The wall is not perfectly circular, and has a few outward notches and protrusions, especially along the eastern half.

The inner surface is terraced, and flows down to the floor. The interior wall is the least wide along the northern face, making the floor slightly offset in that direction. Near the mid-point is a system of low central ridges.

Popular culture references

Harpalus was the rocket landing site in the 1950s

1950s in film

The decade of the 1950s in film involved many significant films.----Contents1 Events2 List of films: # A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z.-Events:...

 science fiction film

Science fiction film

Science fiction film is a film genre that uses science fiction: speculative, science-based depictions of phenomena that are not necessarily accepted by mainstream science, such as extraterrestrial life forms, alien worlds, extrasensory perception, and time travel, often along with futuristic...

 Destination Moon

Destination Moon (film)

Destination Moon is an American science fiction feature film produced by George Pal, who later produced When Worlds Collide, The War of the Worlds, and The Time Machine. Pal commissioned the script by James O'Hanlon and Rip Van Ronkel...

. It was chosen by artist Chesley Bonestell

Chesley Bonestell

Chesley Bonestell was an American painter, designer and illustrator. His paintings were a major influence on science fiction art and illustration, and he helped inspire the American space program...

 as it had a relatively high latitude and the Earth

Earth

Earth is the third planet from the Sun, and the densest and fifth-largest of the eight planets in the Solar System. It is also the largest of the Solar System's four terrestrial planets...

 could be realistically displayed at a low altitude during camera shots. However, the resulting clay model depicted crazing

Crazing

Crazing is a network of fine cracks on the surface of a material, for example in a glaze layer.Crazing is a phenomenon that frequently precedes fracture in some glassy thermoplastic polymers. Crazing occurs in regions of high hydrostatic tension, or in regions of very localized yielding, which...

(net-like cracks) across the crater floor, an addition to which Bonestell objected.

Satellite craters

By convention, these features are identified on lunar maps by placing the letter on the side of the crater mid-point that is closest to Harpalus.

Harpalus	Latitude	Longitude	Diameter
B	56.2° N	43.7° W	8 km
C	55.5° N	45.1° W	10 km
E	52.7° N	50.8° W	7 km
G	53.6° N	52.3° W	11 km
H	53.8° N	53.2° W	8 km
S	51.4° N	49.9° W	5 km
T	50.0° N	49.4° W	4 km