Astronomy Picture of the Day
Discover the cosmos! Each day a different image or photograph of our fascinating universe is featured, along with a brief explanation written by a professional astronomer.
2010 September 1
Credit: NASA/JHU APL/CIW
Explanation: What does Earth look like from the planet Mercury? The robotic spacecraft MESSENGER found out as it looked toward the Earth during its closest approach to the Sun about three months ago. The Earth and Moon are visible as the double spot on the lower left of the above image. Now MESSENGER was not at Mercury when it took the above image, but at a location from which the view would be similar. From Mercury, both the Earth and its comparatively large moon will always appear as small circles of reflected sunlight and will never show a crescent phase. MESSENGER has zipped right by Mercury three times since being launched in 2004, and is scheduled to enter orbit around the innermost planet in March of 2011.
>
0 comments:
Post a Comment
Please comment. After all the typing it would be great to get some feedback for my efforts. and if you cant be bothered to log in and comment anonymous spam, links or other bullshit will not be accepted .... not cool Thank you, Mazanga
https://www.facebook.com/mazanga
https://www.facebook.com/kopimism.il