Posted on 04/24/2008 7:54:09 AM PDT by RightWhale
Tokyo, Japan (SPX) Apr 23, 2008 The Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) and NHK (Japan Broadcasting Corporation) successfully captured a movie of the "Full Earth-Rise"*1 using the onboard High Definition Television (HDTV) of the lunar explorer "KAGUYA " (SELENE) on April 6, 2008 (Japan Standard Time, JST, all the following dates and time are JST.) The KAGUYA is currently flying in a lunar orbit at an altitude of about 100 km. An "Earth-rise," or the rising Earth over the Moon, was first captured by the Apollo project. The Earth rising image taken by the KAGUYA on November 7, 2007, was not a full Earth-rise (i.e. not all of the globe was seen in shining blue.) It missed some part. This time, a "full Earth-rise"(1) was taken by the onboard HDTV in faraway space, some 380,000 km away from the Earth.
This is the world's first successful shooting of such a Full Earth-Rise. It was also very precious because it was one of only two chances in a year for the KAGUYA to capture a Full Earth-Rise when the orbits of the Moon, the Earth, the Sun and the KAGUYA are all lined up.
The shooting was performed by the KAGUYA's onboard HDTV for space use, which was developed by NHK. The movie data was received at JAXA, then processed by NHK.
(1) The phenomenon expressed as a "Full Earth-Rise" can be seen from a satellite that travels around the Moon such as the KAGUYA (SELENE) or the Apollo manned spacecraft. The Earth is almost stationary when it is observed from the Moon, thus a Full Earth-Rise coming out from the horizon cannot be seen from the Moon.
The HDTV video is also interesting
It’s kinda surreal when you realize we were running around going about our daily lives while that footage was being taken.
Very cool!!!
This is the world's first successful shooting of such a Full Earth-Rise. It was also very precious because it was one of only two chances in a year for the KAGUYA to capture a Full Earth-Rise when the orbits of the Moon, the Earth, the Sun and the KAGUYA are all lined up.Syzygy occurs when the Sun, Earth and Moon are aligned, not their orbits.
My garden is not looking well in that image, but then it was still zero a week ago and will snow tonight as well so the ground will be frozen a while longer.
My new desktop!
Just think, someone may be seeing that every one of their days!!
Me too
What’s even more surreal is I was listening to the Blade Runner soundtrack by Vangelis when I watched it.
btw, I believe there are some other videos from that satellite flying over the surface of the moon out there somewhere.
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