Incredible footage from a NASA astronaut captures “star trails in space” aboard the International Space Station
- A NASA astronaut captured a stunning photo of “star trails” while on a mission aboard the International Space Station.
- The viral photo shows the curved paths of distant stars and Earth illuminated by city lights and lightning bolts.
- The photo was posted on Reddit on September 11 and received over 68,000 likes and hundreds of comments from users.
A NASA An astronaut captured star trails from space in a stunning image captured on board International Space Station.
Donald Pettit, an active American astronaut who traveled to the ISS three times, was able to use his free time during his missions to take pictures of space from inside the station’s glass dome – known as the dome – which offers epic views of space. .
I set up his Nikon D3s camera and left him to shoot a 15 minute exposure.
The white lines at the top of the image show the tracks of distant stars that have been warped by the space station’s orbit around Earth.
A NASA astronaut photographed star trails from space aboard the International Space Station (above image above).
The Earth itself is visible in the lower half of the image, with orange streaks of city lights and countless blue dots—each representing a lightning strike from the storm below.
The image shows a green glow, known as the airglow, that separates the Earth from space. It is similar in color to the auroras in the night sky that most people know as the Northern and Southern Lights.
“Auroras are excited by electrons and other solar particles coming down from Earth’s magnetic fields, so you see them in the polar regions,” Pettit said. Newsweek. “Airglow is everywhere on Earth, and molecules in the upper atmosphere are excited by the sun’s activity.”
The photo was posted on Reddit on September 11 and received over 68,000 likes and hundreds of comments from users.
Donald Pettit (above), who has visited the ISS three times, was able to use his free time during his missions to take pictures of space from inside the station’s glass dome – known as the cupola – which offers epic views of space.
Pettit also explained how the astronauts were able to find time to take pictures of space.
“We work 12- to 14-hour days at the station, six days a week, and outside of that, you’re off duty,” he told Newsweek.
“Outside of your normal working hours, you can do whatever you want, including sleeping, eating and connecting with your family. And then you can spend this time with photography. If I could do photography for a few hours a day, it would be a real pleasure.”
Pettit posted the photo on Reddit on Sept. 11, and it has received more than 68,000 likes and hundreds of comments from users.
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