Starship Asterisk*

Earth and Moon from MESSENGER

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.

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And there are all of us.
Grettings
César

What is the point of light to the far right of the Earth and moon system. Is it Mars?

Earth and Moon, the double planet.

Ann

john Green wrote:What is the point of light to the far right of the Earth and moon system. Is it Mars?

According to the info in an older apod 060319 the current position of Mars is behind Earth as seen from Mercury's orbit. Mars would be a likely candidate for the dot to the right of the image and in line with The Earth/Moon system

Just on this pic, I am curious as to what the 3 streaks of light are on the top right of the large image...

One is quite large and the other 2 smaller.

http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/image/1009/ea ... er_big.png

Any info would be great.

Hi Robert,

Would the earth / moon pair be visible to the naked eye from this position? Or would one need binoculars or telescope?

Paul

pking51 wrote: Would the earth / moon pair be visible to the naked eye from this position? Or would one need binoculars or telescope?

A rapid & grossly inaccurate mental calulation yields a Earth-Moon separation of the order of 10 arc minutes as seen from the Sun (or Mercury). So, yes I assume they could be separated by eye.

john Green wrote:What is the point of light to the far right of the Earth and moon system. Is it Mars?

If this was taken 3 months ago there wouldn't have been anything behind us as seen from Mercurys orbit. Saturn and Mars were at a 90 degree angle to the right, and Jupiter would be about the same to the left.

Ann wrote:Earth and Moon, the double planet.

Ann

exactly what I thought!

Earth and Moon, the double planet.

Ann

And then there's the other double planet
http://www.google.com/images?rlz=1T4GZA ... 66&bih=302
The movie of Messenger zeroing in on Mercury http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=otF2FjpCyZk neat!

I would've thought that the blue planet would appear a bit blue? It is always amazing how large our moon is compared to the Earth.

I love this image.

Earth appears a little flattened on the left (non-Moon) side, as though it were a small ball of clay that had been made, put down on a table, and then picked up and positioned for this family portrait, table-side to the left.

I love this image. I was very glad to see it as today's APOD!

Because not everyone who views EPOD is an astronomer, the commentary should have included something about why the white moon blob appears to be so close to the white earth blob. After all, the moon is about 30 earth diameters away from earth. Perhaps "resolving power" of the camera?

garyj wrote:Because not everyone who views EPOD is an astronomer, the commentary should have included something about why the white moon blob appears to be so close to the white earth blob. After all, the moon is about 30 earth diameters away from earth. Perhaps "resolving power" of the camera?

As the Moon rotates around the Earth it is either behind the Earth or in front of it; so when the picture was taken; the moon wasn't along side the Earth toward the camera!

Earth in Cancer. I think the bright star to the right is Aldebaran.

Earth in Cancer - really? I was wondering what star field I was seeing. Could not make it out. Humbling, really. I guess you'd have to know the date and position of Messenger to work out the reverse view. How many arcs wide is the whole image?

Such a cool picture... Today’s APOD got me wondering if either Voyager is equipped to research a means to identify Earth like planets by reporting what is seen when looking back at our pale blue dot. Apparently not, the spacecraft are slated to lose power and fuel around 2020.

http://voyager.jpl.nasa.gov/mission/interstellar.html

The Voyagers have enough electrical power and thruster fuel to operate at least until 2020. By that time, Voyager 1 will be 12.4 billion miles (19.9 billion KM) from the Sun and Voyager 2 will be 10.5 billion miles (16.9 billion KM) away. Eventually, the Voyagers will pass other stars. In about 40,000 years, Voyager 1 will drift within 1.6 light years (9.3 trillion miles) of AC+79 3888, a star in the constellation of Camelopardalis. In some 296,000 years, Voyager 2 will pass 4.3 light years (25 trillion miles) from Sirius, the brightest star in the sky . The Voyagers are destined—perhaps eternally—to wander the Milky Way.

And after looking at today’s impressive picture and reading Voyager’s fates… I can't help but feel a sense of physical isolation from the distant stars and yet a mental joy at what science is revealing for us. Kind of like watching one of those fabulous cooking shows on HDTV and no food in my kitchen...

At least I have my wheelbarrow… (Thanks Orin!)

Why does the Earth-Moon distance appear to be less than one Earth diameter?

emc wrote:Such a cool picture... Today’s APOD got me wondering if either Voyager is equipped to research a means to identify Earth like planets by reporting what is seen when looking back at our pale blue dot. Apparently not, the spacecraft are slated to lose power and fuel around 2020.

http://voyager.jpl.nasa.gov/mission/interstellar.html

The Voyagers have enough electrical power and thruster fuel to operate at least until 2020. By that time, Voyager 1 will be 12.4 billion miles (19.9 billion KM) from the Sun and Voyager 2 will be 10.5 billion miles (16.9 billion KM) away. Eventually, the Voyagers will pass other stars. In about 40,000 years, Voyager 1 will drift within 1.6 light years (9.3 trillion miles) of AC+79 3888, a star in the constellation of Camelopardalis. In some 296,000 years, Voyager 2 will pass 4.3 light years (25 trillion miles) from Sirius, the brightest star in the sky . The Voyagers are destined—perhaps eternally—to wander the Milky Way.

And after looking at today’s impressive picture and reading Voyager’s fates… I can't help but feel a sense of physical isolation from the distant stars and yet a mental joy at what science is revealing for us. Kind of like watching one of those fabulous cooking shows on HDTV and no food in my kitchen...

At least I have my wheelbarrow… (Thanks Orin!)

Ed; you remember that?
here's your solar system portrait!

It just hangs there-no strings!! Awesome!!!!!!!!!!!!

Randy Stubbings wrote:Why does the Earth-Moon distance appear to be less than one Earth diameter?

Probably because the Moon is either slightly behind or slightly in front of the Earth in its orbit around it. Theoretically the Moon could have occulted the Earth, so that it wouldn't have shown up in this image.

Ann

Right after I posted my comment I went, duh!

Thank you Messenger!!! What a mind-opening view of our fine planet and its companion!