Tuesday, July 23, 2013

SPACE - View of Earth From Saturn

The Earth, little blue dot on the right,
is seen from Saturn by the Cassini spacecraft,
July 19, 2013.
(NASA/JPL-Caltech/Space Science Institute)

"Earth Strikes a Pose Beneath Saturn's Rings" by JON M. CHANG, ABC News 7/23/2013

The Cassini spacecraft took a day off from exploring Saturn's rings and weather patterns to snap a photo of Earth.  Like Voyager 1 revealed in 1990 when it took a photo of the planet from the edge of the solar system, Earth really does look like a pale blue dot.

Cassini was nearly 900 million miles away when it snapped several photos of Earth.  One of its photos marks the first time that the spacecraft was able to see the moon and Earth as two distinct celestial objects.

The event also marked the first time that people were notified that they could be a participant in the photo shoot.  NASA encouraged people to take pictures of themselves waving at Saturn.

No comments: