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Picture of the day -
December 11, 2005
A Spectacular Earthrise
 Photo courtesy of NASA.
Virtually everyone has seen a sunrise on occasion, but few among us have ever
witnessed an earthrise - a view of the
earth rising over the
moon's
horizon. That experience is unique to one small, elite group of Americans - the
Apollo astronauts who were lucky enough (and brave enough) to strap themselves
to a rocket and visit the moon.
Earthrise can be seen over and over again in a relatively short period of time.
All one has to do is orbit the moon and the earth will rise once with every
revolution! This stunning earthrise scene was photographed by the Apollo 16
astronauts during their second revolution of the moon on April 19, 1972.
There are a couple of very interesting things about this picture. First of all,
if you look carefully at the earth you'll notice that the horizon is jagged, not
smooth. This is because the planet is so large and so close to the moon that we
can actually discern the contours of the terrain.
The second interesting thing you'll notice is that the lunar surface gets darker
towards the horizon. This is because the command module was just getting ready
to pass over the dark side of the moon (which we never get to see from earth).
So there you have it - earthrise - an event that most humans will never
have an opportunity to experience without the aid of a camera.
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