First Solar Eclipse Recorded From Moon 123
dazza101 writes "For the first time ever, we have witnessed a solar eclipse from the moon. On 10 February 2009 Japan's Kaguya lunar orbiter captured the sight of the Earth eclipsing the sun. The spacecraft also recorded this video showing the Earth surrounded by a glowing ring and briefly forming the classic diamond ring that often occurs during a solar eclipse, as seen from down here on Earth."
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Anyone else think that the ship should have been called Bishoujou Senshi Sera Moon? It is a Japanese spacecraft in lunar orbit, after all.
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It's already named after a legendary Moon princess. [wikipedia.org] That story slightly predates Sailor Moon.
BTW, if you're tempted to "Whoosh" because you were joking and thought your joke went over my head, don't. It didn't go over; it clunked into the ground well short of "humorous".
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No, I wasn't going to "whoosh" you. However, I will point out that you are a pedantic snob. End of line.
even better (Score:5, Informative)
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Except the image that at least I'm seeing looks like it was taken with a camera phone taped to the side of the lunar lander. Either that or eclipses on the moon look very pixelated.
(I'm guessing they actually have higher quality photos, just thought it was a bit funny)
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It's even better than a solar eclipse as seen from earth because the earth's atmosphere diffracts light from the sun, causing a ring of light to appear around the planet. Very cool.
The moon's craters and mountains cause the same effect in lunar solar eclipses, no?
Re:even better (Score:5, Informative)
By comparison, on the moon the Earth is approximately three times the angular size of the Sun, so the illumination of the rim only occurs because of atmospheric diffraction. This diffraction of sunlight is also responsible for the reddish light one sees during a lunar eclipse.
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Other than the fact that the size of the Earth appears as three times the size of the sun on the moon, I did know that. I mentioned that it was a similar effect, not the same cause. In Hebrew you could call the effect a "diamond ring" as the sun looks like a diamond and the moon completes the ring.
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Yes, different cause, but same effect.
Re:even better (Score:5, Insightful)
And while I was doing all that, someone took a few amazing photos. Kudos to them!
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..I might have beer right here at work.
Blimey. Eclipse or no eclipse, where I work, that's grounds for dismissal.
Are you folks hiring?
cheers,
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Jeez, a beer or two at the end of the day's practically expected in my office. It's intended as a thank-you for those working a bit late. Very civil, I'm sure you'll agree.
Unfortunately, we're making a whole lot of redundancies and they were announced today.
It's purely a coincidence that the guy beside me was quietly tucking into a bottle of whisky over the course of the afternoon...
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I might have beer right here at work.
Actually, I believe it's called a Freudian slip.
I might have been right here at work.
There, fixed that for myself.
Re:even better (Score:5, Interesting)
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Ok, that was cringe-worthy.
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I presume that was supposed to be 'been right here at work.' However, after the day I've had, a beer right here at work would be awesome right about now, can I come work with you?
Well now we know (Score:2)
Hoax? (Score:2)
Why the hoax tag? There is no moon? Or have the tinfoil nutjobs awaken earlier today?
Re:Hoax? (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Hoax? (Score:5, Funny)
... it's the earth.
Re:Hoax? (Score:5, Funny)
No; it's a picture the sun, actually. I don't get the big deal about this stupid picture; there's a whole fuckin planet in the way!
Re:Hoax? (Score:5, Funny)
I know what you mean. Earth blocking sun? Happens every night to me.
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I know what you mean. Earth blocking sun? Happens every night to me.
I live in the North Pole you insensitive clod!
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Its either because some people still think we didn't land on the moon, some people were making fun of people who think we didn't land on the moon, or someone thinks that the images are photoshopped. Or just stills from "The Ring."
My god... my phone just rang...
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Why the hoax tag? There is no moon? Or have the tinfoil nutjobs awaken earlier today?
Of course there is a moon... it's just that there isn't an earth.
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Of course, there is no moon.
The moon is a ridiculous liberal myth [slashdot.org].
Re:Hoax? (Score:4, Funny)
The hoax tag is for irony. This Japanese trip to the moon is real, in contrast to the 1969 USian trip that was faked.
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The hoax tag is for irony. This Japanese trip to the moon is real, in contrast to the 1969 USian trip that was faked.
Still, the American special FX were more realistic.
In related news (Score:5, Funny)
The RIAA, on behalf of it's client Universal Media Studios, has issued a DMCA take down notice for the lunar orbiter's obvious infringement of the copyright of the opening credits to the television drama series Hereos.
Re:In related news (Score:5, Insightful)
New Godwin rule: all /. discussions inevitably end in the mention of DRM or the RIAA.
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Not just internet discussions...
I would almost bet that you could find any newsprint from the WW2 era and replace Nazi with RIAA/MPAA, bomber/tank/troops with DRM and Jews with "hackers" and it would sort of make sense.
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Not just internet discussions...
I would almost bet that you could find any newsprint from the WW2 era and replace Nazi with RIAA/MPAA, bomber/tank/troops with DRM and Jews with "hackers" and it would sort of make sense.
"Medium's Appeal Ends
"The hearing of the appeal of Mrs. Helen Duncan, the medium, against her conviction and sentence of nine months' imprisonment under the Witchcraft Act, 1785, concluded in the Court of Appeal yesterday.
"Judgement will be given Monday week."
Nope, I made all the replacements you asked and it doesn't make any sense at all.
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...especially if your computer then doesn't let you back into the house.
--
E
Re:In related news (Score:5, Funny)
Please don't correct him; Universal Media Studios has copyrighted the original word.
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Oh. I thought it was some kind of heroes-related Oreo. You know, like one side is Tracy, Daphne on the other, and I'm the stuffing!
Okay I didn't think that's what he meant, I was thinking about the hero-sammich anyway.
"Pudenda"?! 'scuse me? (Score:3, Funny)
FTFA: "A pudendal lunar eclipse is a phenomenon in which the Sun, Earth and Moon line up in tandem, hence the Moon is in the Earth's pudenda, or, when you look from the Moon, the Sun is partially covered by the Earth (partial eclipse.) During this phenomenon, the volume of sunlight to the Moon decreases, and the Moon's surface looks darker when you look at the Moon from the Earth. The KAGUYA, which circles around the Moon on its polar orbit, can witness this phenomenon only twice a year at most, thus it was very valuable to capture the moving images of the phenomenon from the KAGUYA."
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And shortly after passing the pudenda, the Moon was then in the Earth's taint. The KAGUYA's cameras were turned off in order to avoid seeing what happened after that...
(C)JAXA/NHK (Score:5, Funny)
Re:(C)JAXA/NHK (Score:5, Insightful)
He's basically saying, in Japanese, that this picture was sponsored by JAXA (the Japanese space agency) and NHK (a Japanese television station). It's a joke.
shashin = picture
suponsaa = sponser
okurishimasu = i'll send you, i'll forward to you
This is the Japanese version of "brought to you by $SPONSORS" that any anime or Japanese television fan would recognize as they say it after the credits of nearly every show.
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This is the Japanese version of "brought to you by $SPONSORS" that any anime or Japanese television fan would recognize as they say it after the credits of nearly every show.
Assuming they're watching it in japan. I'm pretty sure when they bring shows over here they don't keep the ads. Which is a shame given that they're much wierder than the ones that we have over here.
Fansubs (Score:2, Funny)
Fansubbers often leave them in. Not the advertising block of course, but the ad from the sponsor, which usually consists of a single image, overlaid on which the names or logos of the sponsors, to a background of the theme music of the series, while a usually female voice says something along the lines of what OP said. Or so I'm told.
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Okay, well then assuming either they watch it in japan, or get the fansubs and happen to speak japanese, because to a non-japanese speaker that's just going to sound like "blahblahblahblah." Speaking from experience, I do watch fansubs and only started remembering what they said when I started taking japanese.
Another finding: the excuse for not doing your japanese homework "I'll just learn it by watching a lot of anime" is a whole lot more fun but absolutely does not work, at least for some people (sample
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I contest that fact on a personal note. I know how to do all of the critical stuff in Japanese:
1) Start fights
2) End fights
3) Hit on women
4) Ask where the bathroom is
5) Command words to transform into various magical girls
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So, uh, you doing anything tonight?
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Trying to look for a girl to date, because I'm a guy. d:
I grew up watching Sailor Moon, alright? Sailor Mercury was cute. haha
It's a trap! (Score:2)
EVEN BETTER ;P
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Your experience is not everything. I suspect that phrase is the first Japanese sentence many people learn (certainly was for me), simply because it's repeated, with exactly the same phrasing, so many times. You don't need to understand the language; any sound can be remembered after so many repetitions.
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Your experience is not everything.
I didn't add enough qualifiers to that statement? I said "Speaking from experience... I... at least for some people... (sample size = 1)" What more do you want from me in terms of not overrepresenting my experience!?!
I am trolling
D'oh!
Terran Eclipse? (Score:5, Informative)
During a total solar eclipse (from the Earth's perspective), the ring of light around the moon is from the sun's photosphere showing around the edges of the moon.
The ring around the earth in the solar eclipse (from the Moon's perspective) is from the light refracting from the atmosphere. I'd think the Earth's relative size would be far too large for an effect like Baily's Beads to be seen from the moon.
Or am I missing something?
Re:Terran Eclipse? (Score:5, Informative)
You are correct. The Moon's angular size is close enough to the Sun's that some eclipses are annular (the Moon is too far away to cover the Sun). Even during a total eclipse, you can see the bright inner corona (not the photosphere - that's what makes it total).
For lunar eclipses, the Earth will generally completely cover the Sun, inner corona and all. However, refraction through the Earth's atmosphere lights up the Lunar landscape, (i.e., the light of every Sun rise and Sun set going on everywhere on Earth). This light - the depth of the eclipse - has been used to infer global atmospheric conditions over historical time [colorado.edu].
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Hmm I still don't get it.
Why is the picture completely black a the beginning. That sould be the state, where the sun is completely and in the middle behind the earth.
Than we start beginning to see the sunlight through the atmosphere. This starts at the top and shortly after this forms about a half circle the sun "breaks through" but as it seems on the right, bottom side.
Im puzzled. Does someone have a link to a good visualization/animation of this?
Wonderful (Score:2, Insightful)
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That would have been nasty. Sunlight unfiltered by the earth's atmosphere? You saw the way the light bloomed in the video. That would have made a mess of an astronaut's eyes. Well, and their face. :)
(ya, ya, I know they have filtered shields on their helmets)
And, we don't have the technology to dump that data back, so it would just have been his (or her) word "Oh, that was beautiful"
Now, if they had done it with a better camera, I would have been more
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How do you figure that we humans are better off, collectively, that a dozen of us have walked on the moon?
Now, before the flame fest begins, let me say that I do indeed agree that the space program has brought to mankind tremendous benefits in terms of knowledge and technology and on and on. That's not what I'm saying.
Apart from the political statement, what was achieved by sending a human to the moon that we could not have achieved some other way?
Neil Armstrong himself, is much better off. But there are mo
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Pitch Dark (Score:2)
You were just eaten by a Grue.
Also populated by space marines.
Am I the only one (Score:1, Funny)
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...who watched the video and suddenly had a flashback of the POV-Ray rendering window? (the first half of the video, that is)
Apollo 12 saw this first (Score:3, Informative)
Apollo 12 went through a solar eclipse [nasa.gov] on the way back from the Moon, shortly after leaving Lunar Orbit.
Conspiracies-R-Us... (Score:5, Funny)
Apollo 12 went through a solar eclipse [nasa.gov] on the way back from the Moon, shortly after leaving Lunar Orbit.
Yeah, and we almost had it on video too, until some moron opened the emergency exit door on the lunar studio and ruined the whole shoot...
Obligatory Pink Floyd Quote... (Score:1)
POV changes, name doesn't. (Score:2, Interesting)
This isn't a solar eclipse, this is a lunar eclipse.
That's what it's called when the earth blocks the sunlight hitting the moon, which is what happened here.
A solar eclipse is when the moon blocks the sunlight hitting the earth. (And would appear, from the moon, as a dark spot moving across the face of the earth.)
Viewing it from the other place doesn't change the name of it. The names are not relative, they're legacy names that don't mean anything. (Otherwise a solar eclipse would be called an 'earth ecl
Re:POV changes, name doesn't. (Score:5, Informative)
This is a solar eclipse because the Sun is being obscured. In a lunar eclipse the Moon is being obscured. If you're on the moon there are no lunar eclipses.
If things always have the same name regardless of where they are viewed, why can't I get to my home coputer by typing "localhost"?
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i suppose if we ever get a serious off-planet population, we'll need a new terminology for eclipses that specifies at least two, and possibly all three, bodies involved (imagine all the transits you could see from a jovian moon colony)
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In a lunar eclipse the Moon is being obscured.
Um, no. The moon cannot be obscured from the earth. A lunar eclipse is when the earth blocks all sunlight from the moon.
A lunar eclipse and a solar eclipse are not the same thing with the sun and moon flipped around, as people, including slashdot editors, seem to think.
If things always have the same name regardless of where they are viewed,
Nice strawman. I didn't say 'things' did, I said that these things did. Or, to put it more clearly, extrapolating the
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'blocks from' might have been a bit unclear. Although sane people might realize there's no such thing as 'sunlight from the moon', and I meant 'blocks all sunlight from reaching the moon', in the same way you'd say 'blocks the football player from the endzone'.
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Your logic doesn't really work. If the Earth obscuring sunlight from hitting the moon is a lunar eclipse regardless of where it's observed from...
Wouldn't an eclipse where the moon blocks the sun be a, "Terran eclipse," regardless of where it's observed from? I mean, your system appears to be be, "That which receives less light is the eponym."
For your logic to work, the only time a solar eclipse would be possible if it the sun got between the moon and the Earth.
I think the fact that we have such a thing a
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Wouldn't an eclipse where the moon blocks the sun be a, "Terran eclipse," regardless of where it's observed from? I mean, your system appears to be be, "That which receives less light is the eponym."
Well, yes, if we named things logically. We don't, or a 'solar eclipse' would be a 'Terran Eclipse' to start with. Even from earth.
Arguing based on the names is like arguing that 'Postmodernism' is, by definition, impossible. Well, yes, if by 'modern' in that we actually meant 'present day'. However, what th
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Actually, doesn't that make it a Terran eclipse, from the lunar point of view?
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Actually, doesn't that make it a Terran eclipse, from the lunar point of view?
No, that would be a solar eclipse here on earth as viewed from the moon. You'd see the shadow of the moon crawling across the planet. (to match a lunar eclipse in nomenclature)
This is a lunar eclipse (from the earth's point of view) as viewed from the moon, which makes it a solar eclipse from the point of view of the moon.
There you go... clear as mud?
Nice shot of the Big Dipper (Score:3, Funny)
Oh wait, maybe that was dust on my monitor.
How long... (Score:1)
until the orbiter gives us some videos of the Apollo 11 landing site, footprints and all?
The orbiter's on a polar orbit, right? So it should pass over it eventually.
Obligatory Headline Quibble (Score:4, Funny)
First Solar Eclipse Recorded From Moon
But wasn't the first solar eclipse a really long time ago?
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Save Versus Dork At -5. (Score:2)
4
FAIL.
This is amazingly cool footage. Hopefully they'll put the entire thing up.
You haven't seen this before?- NASA's Blue Marble (Score:2)
The Eternal Sunset Point (Score:2)
Here's a tip for future space tourism operators:
At some point in the permanent shadow behind the earth, you will see all the sunsets and sunrises on the planet at once, as a bright red ring. It should be an awesome sight, and is something no human has yet seen. The first travel operator who goes there will be able to charge a lot.
I don't know how far out you'd have to be. From the pictures it looks like the Moon is too close.
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Stand by for Strauss and Monoliths (Score:2)
Surveyor 3 (Score:1)
Surveyor 3 recorded a fuzzy image of an eclipse from the lunar surface in 1967.
http://science.nasa.gov/headlines/y2009/25feb_kaguyaeclipse.htm [nasa.gov]
Commodore in Space (Score:2)
That movie starts out just like my TRS-80 graphics plots using parametric trig functions. I thot they stole my homework assignment from 1983 and was getting ready to hire a lawyer. Then I saw the bright glow of the sun popping thru, and thot "Nope, TRS no do that".