Spacecraft beams back riveting photos after buzzing Mercury’s north pole

Some of the best close-up photos yet of Mercury were captured

This image provided by European Space Agency shows close-up photos of Mercury showing northern plains snapped by the European-Japanese spacecraft BepiColombo (European Space Agency via AP)

A spacecraft has beamed back some of the best close-up photos ever of Mercury’s north pole.

The European and Japanese robotic explorer swooped as close as 183 miles (295 kilometers) above Mercury before passing directly over the planet's north pole.

The European Space Agency released the snapshots Thursday, revealing the permanently shadowed craters at the top of of the solar system’s smallest, innermost planet.

Cameras also captured views of neighboring volcanic plains and Mercury's largest impact crater, which spans more than 930 miles (1,500 kilometers).

image provided by European Space Agency shows close-up photos of Mercury showing planet’s Nathair Facula & Fonteyn crater taken by the European-Japanese spacecraft BepiColombo (European Space Agency via AP)

This was the sixth and final flyby of Mercury for the BepiColombo spacecraft since its launch in 2018. The maneuver put the spacecraft on course to enter orbit around Mercury late next year. The spacecraft holds two orbiters, one for Europe and the other for Japan, that will circle the planet's poles.

The spacecraft is named for the late Giuseppe (Bepi) Colombo, a 20th-century Italian mathematician who contributed to NASA's Mariner 10 mission to Mercury in the 1970s and, two decades later, to the Italian Space Agency's tethered satellite project that flew on the U.S. space shuttles.