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Ron Garan / NASA
The moon hangs over Earth's limb like a holiday ornament in a picture from the International Space Station.
To paraphrase Obi-Wan Kenobi, that's no Christmas ornament ... it's a moon. Our moon, of course, hanging above Earth's limb in a picture taken from the International Space Station. It's the first holiday goodie in our Cosmic Log Space Advent Calendar, which will unveil a new picture of Earth as seen from space every day from now until Christmas.
Our second annual photo calendar takes its cue from a traditional Advent calendar, which is built to hide one sweet treat beneath each of 25 doors that are opened sequentially on the appropriate day. The idea is give kids something to sink their teeth into during each day of the holiday season, and build up the anticipation for the big treat on the 25th.
Alan Taylor, who has worked at msnbc.com and The Boston Globe and now runs The Atlantic's In Focus photo feature, extended the concept to Hubble imagery a few years ago. The Planetary Society's Emily Lakdawalla did a similar thing for planetary imagery, and Zooniverse offers a space-themed Advent calendar as well (with Javascript-enabled doors that really work). We jumped on the bandwagon last year, and the calendar proved so popular we decided to do it again this year.
You'll see a fair number of pictures over the next 25 days from NASA astronaut Ron Garan, who spent five and a half months on the space station and now passes out visual goodies on his Fragile Oasis website, his Twitter, Twitpic, Flickr and Facebook accounts and his Google+ page. The picture of Earth below and the moon above is just one of his offerings from October, and it's well worth mooning over.
Come back on Friday for the next picture in the 2011 Cosmic Log Space Advent Calendar.
Connect with the Cosmic Log community by "liking" the log's Facebook page, following @b0yle on Twitter and adding the Cosmic Log page to your Google+ presence. You can also check out "The Case for Pluto," my book about the controversial dwarf planet and the search for new worlds.
Leave a Comment:
Thanks Alan, this is a great pic. Makes you think about how we live in the atmosphere below. (I use Garan's pictures as my desktop background) I look forward to the next one(s).
Out of cultural ignorance, which can be cured by education, you called what is known as an Advent Calendar, a "Holiday Calendar", something that has never existed,. The four weeks before Christmas are known as Advent around the world. But particularly any calendar marking off the days to Christmas has a word already for it. It's called an Advent Calendar. Though that is usually a specifically German thing. But so was the Christmas Tree until Victoria married her German prince Albert and he brought the tradition to England and from there to the world. US culture is already dumbed down enough withoit patronizing us all as if we were just born, or fell off a truck.
Actually, anything can be called a "holiday calendar" if it's around the time of the holidays (which take in more than Christmas). I think I do make reference to Advent calendars as well. Not trying to patronize anyone, but I am trying to be a little more inclusive.
Perhaps it's some kind of cultural arrogance, but Charlie sounds like a real swell guy.
I thoroughly enjoyed last years Cosmic Log Space Advent Calendar. I don't care what it's called.
Wait just a minute here. You are decrying the creation of a Holiday Calendar (a new tradition) which never existed before at the same time you are praising Queen Victorian for bringing a new tradition to England which then traveled to the United States where it never existed before? So are you advocating that we discard the tradition of the Christmas tree in this country because it dumbed us down? Help me out here.
Thank you for the picture Alan. It is a very beautiful and intriguing picture of our lone moon set against the planet we live on. It also provides a bit of scale between two objects that inhabit our solar system.
Unfortunately, it is much easier to comprehend our place on a small planet within a solar system that resides in a corner of a galaxy that is itself one of hundreds of billions in our observable universe than it is to post a simple picture around a certain day on the calendar and not have to defend one's self.
Indeed.
Here's a quick Jingle Bells mashup I put together. (8 artists in 60 seconds)
Identify the most artists and win.
Here's a quick Jingle Bells mashup I put together. (8 artists in 60 seconds)
youtube.com/watch?v=rXLVtoQyl3g
Identify the most artists and win.
I can honestly say I didn't recognize a single artist in that mashup. #2 sounds particularly foreign. Are you really going to give away to $10 gift card?
Alan - what do you mean by 'earth's limb'? I don't believe I've heard the phrase before. Thanks.
I had never heard that phrase before either. There is a definition here:
http://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/IOTD/view.php?id=3338
Some of the most breathtaking views of Earth taken from space are those that capture our planet’s limb. When viewed from the side, the Earth looks like a flat circle, and the atmosphere appears like a halo around it. This edge of the atmosphere is known as the limb.
I had the same question. Googled it and found some pretty cool pictures. Here's a cool one. http://www.google.com/imgres?q=earth%27s+limb&um=1&hl=en&client=firefox-a&sa=N&rls=org.mozilla:en-US:official&biw=1101&bih=878&tbm=isch&tbnid=QeJjrn_FEJpMEM:&imgrefurl=http://www.green-witch.com/newsletter52.html&docid=Qkco5hd0Spw2SM&imgurl=http://www.spaceflight.nasa.gov/gallery/images/shuttle/sts-119/hires/s119e010500.jpg&w=4288&h=2929&ei=1WvZTorEH8mriQKk47yUCg&zoom=1&iact=hc&vpx=452&vpy=363&dur=1623&hovh=185&hovw=272&tx=150&ty=94&sig=102826245719856489370&page=5&tbnh=157&tbnw=222&start=74&ndsp=20&ved=1t:429,r:2,s:74
Great work
Here is an interesting picture that also helps to raise awareness about what's happening in Texas with the drought and the heatwave this year. http://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/NaturalHazards/view.php?id=76575
I can't believe it! I finally found a story with comments that have not become a political fight between Democrats and Republicans. Wow. There really is a Santa Claus!