It took NASA astronaut Josh Cassada simply two phrases to sum up a wonderful portrait of Earth taken from the Worldwide Area Station: “Completely unreal.” The view reveals Earth, seemingly dangling upside-down, with a inexperienced aurora gentle present dancing alongside the planet’s curve.
Cassada tweeted the picture on Tuesday with out providing any extra particulars on it. The white specks on the planet are metropolis lights, whereas the ethereal inexperienced aurora appears to blanket a broad stretch of the world. The shiny, sword-like objects within the foreground are a number of the station’s solar energy arrays.
This is the total view. Inexperienced aurora dance alongside the curve of Earth on this picture from the ISS.
NASA
Cassada is a part of the SpaceX Crew-5 mission that arrived on the ISS in October of final yr with a scheduled return to Earth in March. The scenic inexperienced aurora suggests the picture could also be a current seize exhibiting the earthly aftermath of our solar’s actions. An extraordinary northern lights show was seen as far down as southern England on Sunday evening.
The attention-catching picture obtained reward from area followers and from NASA astronaut Bob Hines, who’s presently down on Earth. “Wow, good shot!” Hines tweeted in response. That is excessive reward coming from Hines, who is aware of a factor or two about recognizing auroras from the ISS.
The picture joins a stellar lineup of gorgeous Earth pictures from the ISS. It speaks to the vastness of area, the ethereal nature of auroras and the attain of humanity, represented right here by the lights we shine at the hours of darkness.