APOD: Home from Above (2010 Nov 15)

[Ann]

I've been thinking of what was said about how high above the Earth that the ISS is orbiting - 350 kilometers. Is that possible? It sounds like nothing to me. I live in southern Sweden, in the city of Malmö, and I know that if I travel by car it takes me between three and four hours to go to the city of Göteborg, about 350 kilometers away. If you look at this map of Europe, you can see Sweden in the upper part of the map colored pink, and you can find the cities of Malmö and Göteborg along the west coast. Surely the height of ISS above sea level of the Earth must be more than the distance between Malmö and Göteborg?

Click to view full size image

Ann

[Chris Peterson]

I've been thinking of what was said about how high above the Earth that the ISS is orbiting - 350 kilometers. Is that possible? It sounds like nothing to me. I live in southern Sweden, in the city of Malmö, and I know that if I travel by car it takes me between three and four hours to go to the city of Göteborg, about 350 kilometers away. If you look at this map of Europe, you can see Sweden in the upper part of the map colored pink, and you can find the cities of Malmö and Göteborg along the west coast. Surely the height of ISS above sea level of the Earth must be more than the distance between Malmö and Göteborg?

Nope, that's how close the ISS is. You imagine that the astronauts are looking out the window and seeing a whole hemisphere of the Earth. But they're not. They are seeing a little circle of the Earth underneath them, more like what you see from an airplane than what you see from, say, a geostationary weather satellite. The horizon is about 2000 km away, so the total visible part of the Earth is only about 10% of its circumference. And once you are looking even 1000 km away, you are seeing things so foreshortened that actually identifying a feature is nearly impossible. The view through the round window probably only covers 100 km or so on the ground- not enough to even identify most geographic features. An image out the window with a standard 50mm lens, which gives a similar FOV as the human eye, spans about 300 km from edge to edge.

[CRAZYAMMY]

PACIFIC!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[jferngrove]

What makes this picture so beautiful is its clarity. We have, well most of the public anyway, grown used to picture of people in space being heavily grainy and in unlikely colours. At last a picture that lets you put yourself actually there. Wonderful.

[DavidLeodis]

The Expedition 24 Crew link brings up information about the Expedition 18 Crew (well it does on my PC when I posted this!).

[turtle]

in the round window, gulf of mexico, mexico and the yucatan penninsula. clouds often define the land mass under them.

[GV]

I think it is Indian Ocean

[redbeet]

It can be Atlantic ocean. What you see in the left window is Labrador. The ridge of clouds seen in the left and top windows are over Gulf streem.

[cloudwalker_3]

Oh God! I am so jealous.

W O W !

[Yves D.]

Pacific Ocean, At the top of the picture is North America and Mexico (Baja California)

[Cathy Krosky]

She is over the Coral Sea, orbiting from SW to NE, with Australia and Papua New Guinea on the horizon.

[waterallaround]

What's that thing in the top left window that's right on the edge of the atmosphere? UFO?!?!?! Or just a smudge on the window...?

[glato]

Pacific Ocean. Top Baja California

[Star*Hopper]

SO, when do we get to see the answer??

[AudeKhatru]

I don't see anything but water in the round window at the bottom.

I think I can see land in the distance, literally at the horizon, in the top left window and extending into the top right window. Based on the lady astronaut being from California I would guess the west coast of the US, but hard to tell exactly where.

It is an amazing photo, and makes me feel the same way I did when I saw the big blue marble photo for the first time. It is just amazing that we can actually take a photo like this.

I want to keep this around and look at it any time I don't feel like out world is futuristic enough.

[dankay67]

SO, when do we get to see the answer??

My thoughts exactly!

[Zaphot]

This shot was taken directly above the center of the Earth. natch.

[Guest]

I think the top left view is Louisiana / Texas

[Smurf]

Is it Cornwall?

[neufer]

Home from Above

Monument to Bacon at his burial place, St Michael's Church in St Albans

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Memorial to Francis Bacon, in the chapel of Trinity College, Cambridge

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<<Francis Bacon, 1st Viscount Saint Alban, KC (22 January 1561 – 9 April 1626) was an English philosopher, statesman, scientist, lawyer, jurist and author. He famously died of pneumonia contracted while studying the effects of freezing on the preservation of meat. He served both as Attorney General and Lord Chancellor of England. Although his political career ended in disgrace, he remained extremely influential through his works, especially as philosophical advocate and practitioner of the scientific method and pioneer in the scientific revolution.

Bacon has been called the father of empiricism. His works established and popularized inductive methodologies for scientific inquiry, often called the Baconian method or simply, the scientific method. His demand for a planned procedure of investigating all things natural marked a new turn in the rhetorical and theoretical framework for science, much of which still surrounds conceptions of proper methodology today. His dedication probably led to his death, bringing him into a rare historical group of scientists who were killed by their own experiments.

On 9 April 1626 Bacon died while at Arundel mansion at Highgate outside London of pneumonia. An influential account of the circumstances of his death was given by John Aubrey. Aubrey's vivid account, which portrays Bacon as a martyr to experimental scientific method, had him journeying to Highgate through the snow with the King's physician when he is suddenly inspired by the possibility of using the snow to preserve meat:

"They were resolved they would try the experiment presently. They alighted out of the coach and went into
a poor woman's house at the bottom of Highgate hill, and bought a fowl, and made the woman exenterate it".

After stuffing the fowl with snow, Bacon contracted a fatal case of pneumonia. Some people, including Aubrey, consider these two contiguous, possibly coincidental events as related and causative of his death: "The Snow so chilled him that he immediately fell so extremely ill, that he could not return to his Lodging ... but went to the Earle of Arundel's house at Highgate, where they put him into ... a damp bed that had not been layn-in ... which gave him such a cold that in 2 or 3 days as I remember Mr Hobbes told me, he died of Suffocation.">>

[starbirdcanada]

Gotta be the Pacific

[PlanetJoe]

SO, when do we get to see the answer??

I am guessing the Pacific Ocean. Above what other half-hemisphere would they see no visible land masses? Right? Am I right?

[wtdavis]

Indian Ocean, south of Madagascar; upper left window could show southern tip of the Arabian Peninsula.

[Chris Peterson]

I am guessing the Pacific Ocean. Above what other half-hemisphere would they see no visible land masses? Right? Am I right?

You're not seeing a hemisphere. You're seeing less than 2000 kilometers of the surface, and most of that so near the horizon that identifying any structure would be impossible. What is visible in the lower window spans only one or two hundred kilometers. A view like this is possible over any ocean area of Earth.

[Pax]

@GETDAM - The various objects that are in the upper right window appear to be reflections from within the ISS. No balloons, No UFOs, just reflections of various LEDs within the ISS, or possibly on the camera of the photographer.