Science

Judi Lynn

(162,397 posts) Thu Oct 27, 2022, 01:19 AM Oct 2022

NASA's asteroid surveyor snapped stunning shots of Earth and moon before heading to Jupiter's Trojan

By John Loeffler published about 13 hours ago

The Lucy spacecraft took a magnificent photo of the Earth from nearly 400,000 miles away.

center right a small faint circle, center left a small black and white photo of earth and clouds
Earth and the moon, as seen by the Lucy spacecraft on Oct. 13, at a distance of about 890,000 miles (1.4 million kilometers). (Image credit: NASA/Goddard/SwRI)

NASA's Lucy mission executed the first of three planned slingshot maneuvers around Earth this month in preparation to study Jupiter's Trojan asteroids, but the spacecraft made sure to take some stunning photos of Earth and the moon before retreating into deep space.

The images, taken on Oct. 13 and Oct. 15 as Lucy began its approach toward Earth for a gravity-assisted speed boost on Oct. 16, are more functional than a couple of simple snapshots. The images were taken to help calibrate Lucy's Terminal Tracking Camera (T2CAM) system, which features two identical cameras that the spacecraft will use to pinpoint and track target asteroids as it zips past at high speeds.

The first image, taken on Oct. 13, highlights the incredible distance between the Earth and the moon. At the time, the two bodies sitting at opposite edges of the frame were about 890,000 miles (1.4 million kilometers) away from Lucy, according to a NASA statement. Mission personnel also intended to have the spacecraft photograph the moon on its way back into deep space.

The second photo, snapped two days later, is a close-up shot of the Earth as Lucy approached, taken at a distance of roughly 380,000 miles (620,000 km). In the image, Hadar, Ethiopia, is just visible on the left-most edge of the planet, giving Lucy (and us) a cosmic-eye glimpse of the spot where the 3.2-million-year-old human ancestor fossil for which the mission is named was discovered.