This web page was created programmatically, to learn the article in its unique location you may go to the hyperlink bellow:
https://www.space.com/stargazing/auroras/like-a-mermaid-swimming-through-a-sea-of-auroras-iss-astronauts-photograph-2-comets-dancing-above-the-northern-lights
and if you wish to take away this text from our website please contact us
Astronauts orbiting Earth lately photographed not one however two comets whereas an aurora present danced beneath them.
The International Space Station (ISS) Expedition 73 crew took a number of photos of comets Lemmon (C/2025 A6) and SWAN (C/2025 R2) in latest weeks that had been simply posted to NASA‘s web site and social media pages after the tip of the lengthy authorities shutdown.
Comets are small our bodies made from ice and mud; once they method our solar, radiation stress and warmth give them spectacular tails. Auroras are mild reveals that occur when charged particles from the solar work together with Earth’s ambiance and magnetic discipline, whereas airglow is luminescence brought on by chemical reactions excessive within the ambiance.
NASA did not say who on the crew took the images, however they give the impression of being similar to photographs taken by Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) astronaut Kimiya Yui. Yui, not like the NASA crew, was in a position to hold posting on social media channel X throughout the shutdown. (The NASA astronauts had been allowed to carry out solely important duties throughout the shutdown, similar to ISS science and upkeep.)
Yui supplied descriptions of his images as properly. “You can … distinguish between the two types of tails: ion and dust,” Yui wrote (in Japanese; translation by xAI’s Grok device) on Oct. 20 of a Lemmon picture with the comet backdropped by a starry, bluish-purple sky. (NASA posted a similar image from that very same day on its web site.)
More images came quickly. “After a busy day comes to an end, I’ve been continuing to take photos to soothe my fatigue. Lately, my source of healing has been Lemmon-chan, I suppose?” Yui posted on X with a collection of photographs on Oct. 22. “I find myself thinking things like, ‘What kind of expression will you show me today, I wonder?’ and heading toward the window, and that moment feels as enjoyable as heading out on a date.”
Yui despatched out one other picture collection on Oct. 21, noting modifications in Lemmon’s brightness and tail — in addition to modifications in Earth’s ambiance. Both the Oct. 21 and Oct. 22 photograph units on Yui’s feed are much like an Oct. 23 image on NASA’s web site.
Then, on Oct. 24, Yui discovered Lemmon showing to soften right into a spectacular aurora of inexperienced and yellow mild, which seems to be like an entry on NASA’s picture web site. Lemmon was 57.2 million miles (92.1 million kilometers) from Earth and the ISS was above Fargo, North Dakota when the picture was taken.
“It was just like a mermaid swimming through a sea of auroras,” Yui mentioned of Lemmon. He added the present was “too magnificent” to make use of the acquainted “chan” honorific when referring to Lemmon, so he selected to undertake the extra formal “Lemmon-san.”
That same day, Yui pivoted his attention to what NASA identifies as Comet SWAN, which was about 27.2 million miles (43.8 million km) from Earth on the time. “As the comet approaches the sun, the opportunities to photograph it from the ISS have become very short,” Yui famous of the picture, which reveals SWAN floating above inexperienced and yellow bands of airglow off the coast of Newfoundland and Labrador, Canada.
It’s uncommon to have two vivid comets seen within the sky at roughly the identical time, and particularly uncommon for them to peak in brightness so shut to one another: Lemmon and SWAN each had been at their brightest round Oct. 20 and Oct. 21.
Lemmon was found in January by University of Arizona astronomer David Carson Fuls in photographs from the Mount Lemmon Survey, utilizing the college’s eponymous telescope close to Tucson. SWAN was present in September by Ukrainian newbie astronomer Vladimir Bezugly utilizing photographs from the Solar Wind Anisotropies (SWAN) instrument on the European Space Agency‘s space-based Solar and Heliospheric Observatory (SOHO).
This web page was created programmatically, to learn the article in its unique location you may go to the hyperlink bellow:
https://www.space.com/stargazing/auroras/like-a-mermaid-swimming-through-a-sea-of-auroras-iss-astronauts-photograph-2-comets-dancing-above-the-northern-lights
and if you wish to take away this text from our website please contact us
