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Io · Planum · 6th largest named feature

Nemea Planum

Greek; where Io was turned into a cow by Zeus and given to Hera.

What Nemea Planum is

Nemea Planum is a planum — a high plain or plateau — on Io, 889 km across, centred at 72.3° S, 94.2° E. It is the 6th largest named feature on Io and the 1st largest of its class there.

Where the name comes from

Greek; where Io was turned into a cow by Zeus and given to Hera. The International Astronomical Union approved the name in 1979, under the theme it applies to every planum on Io. Of the 8 features of this class catalogued on Io, the naming categories run Greek (7), Ethiopia (1).

Feature class
a high plain or plateau
Diameter
889 km
about the length of Italy
Coordinates
72.3° S, 94.2° E
Planetocentric, on Io
Name approved
1979
By the IAU Working Group for Planetary System Nomenclature
Naming category
Greek
Europe

What it would take to settle Nemea Planum

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 72.3° S, 94.2° E.

Settlement difficulty here
79/ 100
Harder than most of this world
Io overall
76.7
2.3 harder than the median site
Ranked
229th
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 Nemea Planum'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 planum features on Io