NASA reveals surreal photo of Earth from 4 billion miles away
By Charlotte Edwards, The Sun, February 17, 2020
An updated version of the iconic "Pale Blue Dot" image. EPA
The famous “Pale Blue Dot” image of Earth taken from 4 billion miles away has been remastered and released by NASA for the snap’s 30th anniversary.
To the untrained eye, the image may not look like much, but that one pale blue pixel you’re looking at is Earth in the vastness of space.
The Pale Blue Dot was one of the final pictures ever taken by NASA’s Voyager probe before its cameras were shut down forever to conserve power.
Voyager had already completed its tour of the planets and was set to head into interstellar space.
However, two imaging scientists working on the mission, Carl Sagan and Carolyn Porco, thought it should take a final photo of the solar system.
Lots of the other planets didn’t turn out as well in the 60 final frames, but something about Earth’s pale blue light has captured the imaginations of space fans for decades.
In his 1994 book “Pale Blue Dot: A Vision of the Human Future in Space,” Sagan wrote: “Look again at that dot. That’s here. That’s home. That’s us.”
He also noted how Earth was majestically suspended in a sunbeam.
NASA released the image for Valentine’s Day and wrote: “On Valentine’s Day in 1990, cruising four billion miles from the Sun, the Voyager 1 spacecraft looked back one last time to make the first ever Solar System family portrait.
“The portrait consists of the Sun and six planets in a 60 frame mosaic made from a vantage point 32 degrees above the ecliptic plane.
“Planet Earth was captured within a single pixel in this single frame. It’s the pale blue dot within the sunbeam just right of center in this reprocessed version of the now famous view from Voyager.
“Astronomer Carl Sagan originated the idea of using Voyager’s camera to look back toward home from a distant perspective.
“Thirty years later, on this Valentine’s day, look again at the pale blue dot.”
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