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The view from Parker
Solar Probe’s WISPR instrument on Sept. 25, 2018, shows Earth, the bright
sphere near the middle of the right-hand panel. The elongated mark toward the
bottom of the panel is a lens reflection from the WISPR instrument.
Credits: NASA/Naval Research Laboratory/Parker Solar Probe |
Ken Kremer -- SpaceUpClose.com -- 27 October 2018
KENNEDY SPACE CENTER, FL – NASA’s recently launched Parker Solar Probe has snapped a glorious view looking back home to all of humanity as it continues diving towards its first close encounter with the Sun.
The magnificent view of the 'Earth from Space' - seen above - was snapped from a distance of 27 million miles (43 million km) from her Home Planet as the spacecraft was speeding to its first flyby of the Planet Venus setting up the trajectory for the 1st close flyby of the Sun.
“On Sept. 25, 2018, Parker Solar Probe captured a view of Earth as it sped toward the first Venus gravity assist of the mission,” NASA announced in a statement.
“Earth is the bright, round object visible in the right side of the image.”
“Parker captured this image while speeding toward the 1st Venus gravity assist of our Mission to “touch” the Sun.”
The car sized Parker successfully barreled past Venus at about 4:45 a.m. EDT, Oct. 3 - barely 1500 miles (2400 km) above the surface.
The newly released image was captured by Parker’s only imaging instrument known as WISPR, or Wide-field Imager for Solar Probe.
“During science phases, WISPR sees structures within the Sun's atmosphere, the corona, before they pass over the spacecraft.”
The newly released Parker image is shown in 2 panels which come from the WISPR instruments two telescopes, which point in slightly different directions and have different fields of view.
The left-hand image was captured by inner telescope, while the right-hand image showing Earth was captured by the outer telescope.
The team also released an enlarged zoomed in image of Earth.
The 23-story tall triple barreled United
Launch Alliance Delta IV Heavy rocket successfully launched at 3:31 a.m. EDT
Aug. 12 from the Florida Space Coast and put on a brilliant display of fire
power with 2.1 million pounds of thrust spewing forth from the trio of liquid
oxygen/liquid hydrogen RS-68A main engines that quickly turned night into day a
few hours before Sundays natural sunrise under nearly cloud-free skies.
Check out our prior Space UpClose gallery of photos and videos. Plus my BBC TV World News prelaunch interview.
Here’s my Parker launch video from a remote camera set at pad 37:
KENNEDY SPACE CENTER, FL – NASA’s recently launched Parker Solar Probe has snapped a glorious view looking back home to all of humanity as it continues diving towards its first close encounter with the Sun.
The magnificent view of the 'Earth from Space' - seen above - was snapped from a distance of 27 million miles (43 million km) from her Home Planet as the spacecraft was speeding to its first flyby of the Planet Venus setting up the trajectory for the 1st close flyby of the Sun.
“On Sept. 25, 2018, Parker Solar Probe captured a view of Earth as it sped toward the first Venus gravity assist of the mission,” NASA announced in a statement.
“Earth is the bright, round object visible in the right side of the image.”
“Parker captured this image while speeding toward the 1st Venus gravity assist of our Mission to “touch” the Sun.”
The car sized Parker successfully barreled past Venus at about 4:45 a.m. EDT, Oct. 3 - barely 1500 miles (2400 km) above the surface.
The newly released image was captured by Parker’s only imaging instrument known as WISPR, or Wide-field Imager for Solar Probe.
“During science phases, WISPR sees structures within the Sun's atmosphere, the corona, before they pass over the spacecraft.”
The newly released Parker image is shown in 2 panels which come from the WISPR instruments two telescopes, which point in slightly different directions and have different fields of view.
The left-hand image was captured by inner telescope, while the right-hand image showing Earth was captured by the outer telescope.
The team also released an enlarged zoomed in image of Earth.
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A close-up of Earth from
WISPR's Sept. 25, 2018, image shows what appears to be a bulge on our planet’s
right side — this is the Moon. Credits:
NASA/Naval Research Laboratory/Parker Solar Probe
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If you look closely you may notice a slight bulge
on the right side.
That bulge is the Moon – “just peeking out from behind Earth.”
Below Earth is a hemispherical shaped feature that’s a result of lens flare produced as a result of very bright Earthshine.
Other well known celestial objects are also visible in the image — like Pleiades to the low-left of Earth in the right-hand image and the two bright objects, Betelgeuse and Bellatrix, near the bottom of the left-hand image. They appear elongated because of reflections on the edge of the detector, says NASA.
The 1st solar encounter period begins on Oct. 31 and lasts through Nov. 11.
Closest approach to the Sun will occur on Nov. 5.
The mission will conduct 7 Venus flyby’s to set up 24 perihelion close encounters with the sun through 2024. The Venus flyby’s will precisely set its trajectory toward the Sun and slow the probe down instead of speeding it up.
The $1 Billion mission began with a dazzling middle-of-the-night blastoff of the mighty Delta IV Heavy rocket in the wee hours of Sunday morning, Aug. 12 – and delivered the car sized spacecraft to its intended trajectory towards Venus and the Sun.
That bulge is the Moon – “just peeking out from behind Earth.”
Below Earth is a hemispherical shaped feature that’s a result of lens flare produced as a result of very bright Earthshine.
Other well known celestial objects are also visible in the image — like Pleiades to the low-left of Earth in the right-hand image and the two bright objects, Betelgeuse and Bellatrix, near the bottom of the left-hand image. They appear elongated because of reflections on the edge of the detector, says NASA.
The 1st solar encounter period begins on Oct. 31 and lasts through Nov. 11.
Closest approach to the Sun will occur on Nov. 5.
The mission will conduct 7 Venus flyby’s to set up 24 perihelion close encounters with the sun through 2024. The Venus flyby’s will precisely set its trajectory toward the Sun and slow the probe down instead of speeding it up.
The $1 Billion mission began with a dazzling middle-of-the-night blastoff of the mighty Delta IV Heavy rocket in the wee hours of Sunday morning, Aug. 12 – and delivered the car sized spacecraft to its intended trajectory towards Venus and the Sun.
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The
United Launch Alliance Delta IV Heavy rocket launches NASA's Parker Solar Probe
to touch the Sun and dive into the corona, Sunday, Aug. 12, 2018, at 3:31 a.m.
EDT from Space Launch Complex 37 at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station, Florida. From
camera at pad. Credit: Ken
Kremer/kenkremer.com/spaceupclose.com
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Check out our prior Space UpClose gallery of photos and videos. Plus my BBC TV World News prelaunch interview.
Here’s my Parker launch video from a remote camera set at pad 37:
Here’s my BBC TV World News Pre-Launch interview:
Stay tuned here for Ken's continuing Earth and Planetary science and human spaceflight news: www.kenkremer.com –www.spaceupclose.com – twitter @ken_kremer – email: ken at kenkremer.com
Dr. Kremer is a research scientist and journalist based in the KSC area.
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Ken’s photos are for sale and he is available for lectures and outreach events
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| The orbit design for the Parker Solar Probe mission illustrating the trajectory through the inner solar system following Aug. 12, 2018 launch from Cape Canaveral, FL. Credit: NASA/Johns Hopkins APL |
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