Earth and Moon

[Eric Mc]

Picture taken by the Juno probe as it passed the 7.5 million mile mark on its 5 year journey to Jupiter.

[russ_a]

Wouldn't have thought that the Moon was so far away from the Earth at that distance.

[Eric Mc]

It's probably further.

The apparent gap will be influenced by the alignment of the two bodies from the viewpoint of the probe.

The true gap is 250,000 miles.

A quick Google reveals that the moon is approximately 31 times the earth's diameter away from the earth. So. in an exact side on view, the gap between the two objects with by the equivalent of 31 earths.

Edited by Eric Mc on Thursday 1st September 12:59

[rufusruffcutt]

Excellent photo.

It reminds me of Carl Sagan's quote 'Pale Blue Dot' on the Voyager 1 photograph.

"From this distant vantage point, the Earth might not seem of any particular interest. But for us, it's different. Look again at that dot. That's here, that's home, that's us. On it everyone you love, everyone you know, everyone you ever heard of, every human being who ever was, lived out their lives. The aggregate of our joy and suffering, thousands of confident religions, ideologies, and economic doctrines, every hunter and forager, every hero and coward, every creator and destroyer of civilization, every king and peasant, every young couple in love, every mother and father, hopeful child, inventor and explorer, every teacher of morals, every corrupt politician, every "superstar," every "supreme leader," every saint and sinner in the history of our species lived there – on a mote of dust suspended in a sunbeam."

[Eric Mc]

Bedazzled said:

Nice pic, odd it's not blue, must have been a cloudy day... or just a B&W camera?

I;m sure there is blue in there. These cameras tend to be not true colour cameras but three wavelength filter (red-green-blue) cameras from which the colours can be reassembled by computer processing. How the colours look is very much down to how the image was processed.

[perdu]

Eric thanks for the picture

Not too concerned about the relative sizes, seem about right to me and the picture will have been blown large and cropped anyway

but

Blimey

Aren't we all lonely out here on that tiny blob of rock, with only our dear sister/baby planet nearby...

All I see is backness and us

just a bit wow

[bulb763]

"...On the scale of worlds, yumans.. are inconsequential."

OT: Eric, just wanted to say I've finished watching those James Burke docs you linked to - thanks for posting them.

[Eric Mc]

bulb763 said:

"...On the scale of worlds, yumans.. are inconsequential."

OT: Eric, just wanted to say I've finished watching those James Burke docs you linked to - thanks for posting them.

They are quite good, aren't they.

[Eric Mc]

perdu said:

Eric thanks for the picture

Not too concerned about the relative sizes, seem about right to me and the picture will have been blown large and cropped anyway

but

Blimey

Aren't we all lonely out here on that tiny blob of rock, with only our dear sister/baby planet nearby...

All I see is backness and us

just a bit wow

Theres a lot of space in space.

[cpufreak]

looking back the other way.. I took this last year. of jupiter and some of its moons

[bulb763]

Eric Mc said:

bulb763 said:

"...On the scale of worlds, yumans.. are inconsequential."

OT: Eric, just wanted to say I've finished watching those James Burke docs you linked to - thanks for posting them.

They are quite good, aren't they.

They are excellent. Seen footage I'd never seen before and loved the chats with the group of Apollo astronauts, particularly the explanation of, erm, no. 2s. I bet Lovell makes an excellent speaker

[Eric Mc]

I particularly like the argument they have over the effect of the Apollo 1 fire. Jim McDivitt, who oversaw some of the changes to the Apollo Command Module after the fire emphasises that NONE of the major differences between the Block 1 and Block 2 Command Module were brought in because of the fire - especially the oft mentioned outward opening hatch.

It is amazing that even today, programmes on Apollo still mention these untruths when recounting the Apollo 1 fire.

[Tonymg]

Guys Guys all i can say about the First photo is WoW........ big time

[Eric Mc]

In the same vein, this shot was taken in 1990 by the Galileo probe as it performed a fly-by of the earth-moon system on its way to Jupiter.

[annodomini2]

My favourite analogy "There are more stars in the Universe than grains of sand on Earth"

[bulb763]

Another Cassini jobbie, apparently.



http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap110904.html

That "pale blue dot" to the left is Earth

[nellyleelephant]

As beuatiful as that image is, it doesn't compare to seeing it with your own eyes.
If you ever get the chance to look through a decent scope at Saturn, grab it.

[Condi]

cpufreak said:

looking back the other way.. I took this last year. of jupiter and some of its moons

from where?

[ChiChoAndy]

bulb763 said:

Another Cassini jobbie, apparently.



http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap110904.html

That "pale blue dot" to the left is Earth

I've got that as my iPad wallpaper. It's weird. Doesn't look at all real, more like a computer interpretation. I have a framed pic of the 'pale blue dot' with the Sagan description.

Edited by ChiChoAndy on Monday 5th September 21:23

[bulb763]

ChiChoAndy said:

I've got that as my iPad wallpaper. It's weird. Doesn't look at all real, more like a computer interpretation. I have a framed pic of the 'pale blue dot' with the Sagan description.

Edited by ChiChoAndy on Monday 5th September 21:23

Cool. I was planning on getting the same, sans description, once I've finished decorating and have somewhere to hang it. Love the video that goes with it.