Message to Earth people:Take a deeper view.

"The MESSENGER spacecraft – less than three months from the Earth flyby that will slingshot it toward the inner solar system – successfully tested its main camera by snapping distant approach shots of Earth and the Moon."


"Taken May 11, 2005, this processed image comes from the narrow-angle camera of the Mercury Dual Imaging System on NASA’s MESSENGER spacecraft. Earth was about 18.4 million miles (29.6 million kilometers) from MESSENGER at the time, but the image clearly shows bands of clouds between North and South America on Earth’s sunlit side. The Moon was 248,898 miles (400,563 kilometers) from Earth at the time of the image. The contrast was adjusted to bring out the Moon. The Moon is actually much darker than the Earth – click here for an image showing true relative brightness.

"The photo session was just part of the preparations for MESSENGER’s gravity-assisted flyby of Earth on Aug. 2 – the first major adjustment to MESSENGER’s flight path toward Mercury since the spacecraft was launched on Aug. 3, 2004. After one flyby of Earth, two flybys of Venus, and three of Mercury, MESSENGER will begin an unprecedented, yearlong science orbit around the innermost planet in March 2011.

via robot wisdom