NASA plans a new Cassini photograph of Saturn with the Earth in the background

Posted on June 21, 2013 by Madsen Pirie

NASA scientists are preparing to position the Cassini spacecraft so that it takes a photograph of Saturn with the Earth in the background. This will take place on July 19th 2013, when the probe will be about 898 million miles from Earth, nearly 10 times farther away than the Earth s from the sun. It will not be the first such photo. Cassini has been orbiting Saturn for nearly nine years, and in September 2006 it sent back the photograph shown above, in which the Earth is the white dot on the upper left, just beyond the bright rings. (Click on the photo to see it). Everything that happened on Earth from the dinosaurs to the whole of human history took place on that white dot. This will, however, be the first such photo we’ve had notice of, and the people at NASA humorously suggest that many of us should stop and wave as we have our picture taken.