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Io · Regio · 5th largest named feature

Illyrikon Regio

Io passed by here in her wanderings.

What Illyrikon Regio is

Illyrikon Regio is a regio — a large area distinguished by its brightness or colour — on Io, 1,001 km across, centred at 70.9° S, 177.8° W. It is the 5th largest named feature on Io and the 5th largest of its class there.

Where the name comes from

Io passed by here in her wanderings. The International Astronomical Union approved the name in 1997, under the theme it applies to every regio on Io. Of the 10 features of this class catalogued on Io, the naming categories run Greek (9), Italy (1).

Feature class
a large area distinguished by its brightness or colour
Diameter
1,001 km
about the length of Italy
Coordinates
70.9° S, 177.8° W
Planetocentric, on Io
Name approved
1997
By the IAU Working Group for Planetary System Nomenclature
Naming category
Greek
Europe

What it would take to settle Illyrikon Regio

Io scores 76.7 as a world. That number is the same for every square metre of it — but sunlight, water, radiation and the ground under your feet are not. This is the same question asked at 70.9° S, 177.8° W.

Settlement difficulty here
79.4/ 100
Harder than most of this world
Io overall
76.7
2.7 harder than the median site
Ranked
239th
of 260 named places on Io

What this spot has going for it is ground flat ground — the easiest thing to land on and build across. What works against it is water same as everywhere else on this world.

Computed from Illyrikon Regio's catalogued latitude, longitude and feature class — 84% of the model's weight had a basis here, and 2 axes were dropped as not applicable to Io (earth link, known ground). Gravity, pressure, delta-v and distance from the Sun are the same everywhere on Io and are already counted in the world's own index, not again here.

What this cannot see: elevation. Slope, local shadowing and the polar “peaks of eternal light” — ridge tops near the poles of a barely tilted world that catch sun almost continuously while a crater floor kilometres away never does — need a terrain model this does not have. Where a real mission targets a pole, that is usually why.

What is next to it

The largest regio features on Io

All 10 regiones on Io — mapped together, with the naming theme and the size distribution.