Wolf Moon dwarfs the International Space Station in superb picture captured by photographer

The Wolf Moon that rose on the evenings of three and 4 January 2026 definitely received the brand new yr off to a beautiful begin.

Here at BBC Sky at Night Magazine, we had so many emails, photographs and messages despatched to us about how lovely the total Moon appeared, particularly on the morning of Saturday 3 January when early risers received the the possibility to see it sink under the horizon earlier than daybreak.

The January Wolf Moon was additionally positioned near the planet Jupiter within the night sky, making for a gorgeous conjunction of Moon and planet.

Among the numerous photographs we acquired of the 2026 Wolf Moon, this one actually stood out.

Tianyao Yang captured a picture of the International Space Station passing in entrance of the January full Moon, as seen from Shanghai, China.

It’s a composite picture, whereby the photographer captured a number of views of the ISS, then stitched them collectively utilizing laptop software program, to indicate the Space Station’s path throughout the Moon.

The picture was captured on 3 January 2026 at 20:57:46, China Standard Time, Yang says, which is 12:57 UTC, and it took lower than a second for the ISS to go in entrance of the Moon.

To put the picture into perspective, the International Space Station is about 400km (250 miles) from Earth, whereas the Moon is about 385,000km (239,000 miles) from Earth, in keeping with NASA.

“My photograph records the brief silhouette of the Space Station as it crossed the lunar disk, combining a human-made spacecraft with a natural celestial object in a single moment,” says Yang.

“The final image was produced by selecting and stacking frames from a high-speed continuous shooting sequence to clearly show the outline of the ISS against the bright lunar surface.”

As we await the launch of NASA’s Artemis II early in 2026, which is able to ship human beings across the Moon and again to Earth for the primary time since Apollo 8 in 1968, this picture is a well timed reminder of our shut relationship with our pure satellite tv for pc, but in addition of our small place throughout the enormity of the cosmos.

See extra of Tianyao Yang’s images through his Instagram channel @tythunder17.

Capture particulars

• Equipment: Sony A1 digital camera, Sony 600mm f/4 G Master lens with 2× teleconverter, iOptron HST equatorial mount
• Software: ISO 500, 1/3200s, 30 frames per second steady capturing
• Processing: Frame choice and stacking utilizing picture processing software program

If you are an astrophotographer, whether or not skilled or full newbie, ship us your photographs they usually may seem in a future concern of BBC SKy at Night Magazine