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Jul 23, 2013
Two Views of Earth
Image Credit & Copyright: Astronomy Picture of the Day -- http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/astropix.html
Courtesy of http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/astropix.html
Two Views of Earth
Image Credit & Copyright: Astronomy Picture of the Day -- http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/astropix.html
Courtesy of http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/astropix.html
In a cross-Solar System interplanetary first,
our Earth was photographed during the same day from both Mercury and Saturn.
Pictured on the left, Earth is the
pale blue dot
just below the rings of Saturn, as captured by the
robotic Cassini spacecraft
now the gas giant.
Pictured on the right, the
Earth-Moon system is seen against a dark background,
as captured by the
robotic MESSENGER spacecraft
now orbiting Mercury.
In the
MESSENGER image, the Earth (left) and Moon (right)
shine brightly with reflected sunlight.
MESSENGER took the overexposed image last Friday as part of a search for small natural satellites of the innermost planet, moons that would be expected to be quite dim.
During this same day,
humans across
planet Earth snapped many of their own
pictures of Saturn.
