APOD: Earth and Moon from Saturn (2013 Jul 22)

[yellowbag]

astonishing. simply astonishing. astounding, phenomonal and flabbergasting!!

[neufer]

Today's APOD has been updated due to a better image being released during the day.

So it really is pale blue (without Anthony Barreiro's white shirt being visible that is).

[Boomer12k]

So....um....well.....er.....uh......Doesn't this make Cassini.... a DRONE??????

Spying on us....ALL of us....Well it is an interesting picture...and shows that we are all in the same boat....there is no where to go....


:---[===] *

[neufer]

So....um....well.....er.....uh......Doesn't this make Cassini.... a DRONE??????

Spying on us....ALL of us....Well it is an interesting picture...
and shows that we are all in the same boat....there is no where to go....

[b][color=#0000FF]Hawaiian fisherman Anthony Wichman was nearly killed while catching this 230-pound Ahi tuna.[/color][/b]

---

Giant Tuna Capsizes Boat, Pulls Man Into Sea
By Douglas Main, Live Science, July 22, 2013

<<Anthony Wichman had nearly pulled in a massive 230-pound (104 kilograms) Ahi tuna when the fish decided not to give up without a fight, suddenly diving deeper and capsizing Wichman's boat. One problem: The Hawaiian fisherman's leg was wrapped in the line, and he was pulled underwater by the fish, according to news reports. Somehow he managed to free himself and make it back to the boat, where he called his daughter using a waterproof cell phone, according to KHON2, a Hawaiian news station.

"All I could hear was him hyper-ventilating and puking," Anuhea Wichman told KHON2. "And through his breathing, he was able to say three words: sinking, Coast Guard, and buoy." (He had reportedly been fishing near a prominent buoy.) The Coast Guard was then able to find him using the GPS position of his phone.

The fisherman was taken to the hospital with minor injuries, KHON2 reported. Friends of his then hauled his boat back to shore — with the fish still on the line.>>

[dstn]

Long time APOD fan, first time poster.

Here is my annotated version of the wide-field image version of today's APOD:
http://broiler.astrometry.net/~dstn/temp/17171-ann.jpg



(copy of the original wide-field image is here: http://broiler.astrometry.net/~dstn/temp/17171.jpg -- fun to blink between those two)

Making-of: I took the wide-field image, pulled a few strings and managed to get Astrometry.net to recognize it, then annotated the Henry Draper (HD) stars in the frame. Then I queried the JPL Horizons database to find out where the Earth and Moon would appear (from Saturn, not Cassini, boo); those are the blue and gray dots, for 2013-06-20 to 2013-08-20 in steps of 1 day. (The picture was taken "July 19", according to press.) The grid lines are RA,Dec. Astrometry.net solution: http://nova.astrometry.net/user_images/63212 .

cheers,
dustin

[rj rl]

What's that dusty arc appearing diagonally around the Earth?

[Markus Schwarz]

Today's APOD has been updated due to a better image being released during the day.
- RJN

This solves my question. Thanks!

[emc]

The image has not been calibrated and I wonder if the horizontal bands are due to interlacing.

The camera doesn't have an interlaced readout. The bands are from noise.

Thanks Chris, I appreciate the information and link.

[FARROUT]

This looks more like the image from Messanger. Did someone make an error?

[dstn]

No error, this is definitely the one from near Saturn. You can see from the annotation: that it's taken from Saturn; otherwise Earth would appear in front of a different backdrop of stars.

[BMAONE23]

Just curious... What would Jupiter look like at it's closest approach to Saturn?

The moon is 2159 miles diameter and orbits at 238,606 miles distant. It covers an area of the sky equivalent to 0.5 deg (1/2) deg or 30 arc minutes.
At closest approach to Saturn, Jupiter is roughly 100,000,000 miles away. Given it's size of 88846 miles diameter, at that distance it would cover 0.05 deg or 03 arc min. About 1/10th the apparent size of the moon from Earth

My avatar depicts how they would appear relative to the moon as viewed from earth

Roughly 100,000,000 miles away (i.e., ~1.1 AU away)...I don't think so.

Bode's Law states that Saturn & Jupiter should be ~4.8 AU apart and Earth & Jupiter ~4.2 AU apart.

The actual orbits make Saturn & Jupiter ~4.34 AU apart and Earth & Jupiter ~4.2 AU apart.

Hence, Jupiter appears slightly larger from Earth than from Saturn.

Jupiter can be as large as 50.1 arc seconds in Earth's midnight sky with an apparent magnitude of -2.94.

Jupiter can be almost that large in Saturn's midday sky but not nearly so bright.

On June 24, 2000 Jupiter was 4.15 AU away from Saturn at a large 47.5 arc seconds but it was only magnitude 5.2 since only a thin Jupiter South Pole crescent was visible in Saturn's midday sky.

Hence, our view of Jupiter is far superior to Saturn's view.

Nothing worse than Band Noise to disrupt an otherwise harmonious image

http://asterisk.apod.com/viewtopic.php? ... 90#p203608

As usual, Neufer is correct. I should have figured the distance instead of trusting a Google Search. I calculated a relative difference between orbits of 551,070,000 K or 342,419,021 miles but with Jupiter's average orbit of 778,030,000k
But I reach an average distance between Earth and Jupiter of 628,730,000k so Jupiter is closer to Saturn and should appear slightly larger in the sky there than it does here

[rj rl]

No ideas about this thing http://i.imgur.com/OqGPiRs.jpg?1 ?

[geckzilla]

No ideas about this thing http://i.imgur.com/OqGPiRs.jpg?1 ?

I can't decide if that's some kind of optical artifact from the camera or if it's actually part of the ring system. I know that the previously photographed shadow of Saturn had some similar streaks: http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap061016.html
Coincidentally, there are some very similar streaks next to the pale blue dot once again.

[rj rl]

No ideas about this thing http://i.imgur.com/OqGPiRs.jpg?1 ?

I can't decide if that's some kind of optical artifact from the camera or if it's actually part of the ring system. I know that the previously photographed shadow of Saturn had some similar streaks: http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap061016.html
Coincidentally, there are some very similar streaks next to the pale blue dot once again.

looks quite similar, the difference being that these streaks are crossing the sun when prolonged, it probably has to do something with optics this time.

[alter-ego]

Roughly 100,000,000 miles away (i.e., ~1.1 AU away)...I don't think so.

Bode's Law states that Saturn & Jupiter should be ~4.8 AU apart and Earth & Jupiter ~4.2 AU apart.

The actual orbits make Saturn & Jupiter ~4.34 AU apart and Earth & Jupiter ~4.2 AU apart.

Hence, Jupiter appears slightly larger from Earth than from Saturn.

Jupiter can be as large as 50.1 arc seconds in Earth's midnight sky with an apparent magnitude of -2.94.

Jupiter can be almost that large in Saturn's midday sky but not nearly so bright.

On June 24, 2000 Jupiter was 4.15 AU away from Saturn at a large 47.5 arc seconds but it was only magnitude 5.2 since only a thin Jupiter South Pole crescent was visible in Saturn's midday sky.

Hence, our view of Jupiter is far superior to Saturn's view.

As usual, Neufer is correct. I should have figured the distance instead of trusting a Google Search. I calculated a relative difference between orbits of 551,070,000 K or 342,419,021 miles but with Jupiter's average orbit of 778,030,000k
But I reach an average distance between Earth and Jupiter of 628,730,000k so Jupiter is closer to Saturn and should appear slightly larger in the sky there than it does here

Click to view full size image

Yes you are right, as viewed from Saturn, Jupiter will appear a little larger at closest approach.

The orbit elipticities and orientations lead to a rare close separation (in year 2417) ~3.81 AU, with Jupiter's apparent diameter = 51.8", compared to the a 50.1" maximum apparent diameter from Earth (3.94 AU separation). I identified a time where Jupiter's separation from the Sun (as viewed from Saturn) will be <11 arcminutes, so the view might be pretty neat. I can imagine a dimly lit annulus, and possibly a faint view of the ring(s). Although most of the time I'd prefer viewing Jupiter from Earth, Jupiter at or near inferior conjunction might yield some nice photos.

Of course, I'm thinking we would be outside of Saturn's atmosphere.

[Psnarf]

That's me waving, third row, second from the left.

[neufer]

Click to view full size image

Yes you are right, as viewed from Saturn, Jupiter will appear a little larger at closest approach.

The orbit ellipticities and orientations lead to a rare close separation (in year 2417) ~3.81 AU, with Jupiter's apparent diameter = 51.8", compared to the a 50.1" maximum apparent diameter from Earth (3.94 AU separation). I identified a time where Jupiter's separation from the Sun (as viewed from Saturn) will be <11 arcminutes, so the view might be pretty neat. I can imagine a dimly lit annulus, and possibly a faint view of the ring(s). Although most of the time I'd prefer viewing Jupiter from Earth, Jupiter at or near inferior conjunction might yield some nice photos.

Of course, I'm thinking we would be outside of Saturn's atmosphere.

The rare Jupiter transit would be nice.
(Jupiter being a tenth the size of the Sun but 2.2 times closer to Saturn making it ~22% the apparent size.)

[casus]

why did no one mention that the light from earth/moon took an hour and 20 minutes to reach the camera? (according to my calcs...)

[neufer]

That's me waving, third row, second from the left.

From your avatar one would have thought you to be more camera shy.