[HN Gopher] Lunar Flyby
___________________________________________________________________
Lunar Flyby
Author : kipi
Score : 923 points
Date : 2026-04-07 15:03 UTC (1 days ago)
(HTM) web link (www.nasa.gov)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.nasa.gov)
| ranger207 wrote:
| I have to admit, I've been an Artemis hater ($4 billion per
| launch lol) but the experience of watching people go back around
| the Moon has been incredibly inspiring, and it proves to me that
| maybe we _can_ still do hard things
| jameslk wrote:
| > $4 billion per launch lol
|
| The US spends almost that much on net debt interest each day
| (~$3 billion/day[0]). Not that adding to the debt helps at all,
| but the old proverb about being penny wise and pound foolish
| seems relevant
|
| 0. https://www.cbo.gov/publication/61951
| ToucanLoucan wrote:
| Also we spend that much every 4 days we're in Iran, and
| that's only ONE of our neo-colonialist irons in the fire, as
| it were.
|
| If you want to make the US financially solvent, cut defense.
| Defense LAPS every other budget category. Whether you want to
| take the conservative position on why that is (our allies
| freeload on our defense spending) or the Progressive one (the
| U.S. is an empire in decline and every major empire through
| history has spent vast sums to maintain itself why would the
| U.S. be different) doesn't change the fact that our military
| budgets exceed over a dozen other nations' combined, the vast
| majority of whom are allies.
| Jblx2 wrote:
| >Defense LAPS every other budget category.
|
| I suppose it matters how you lump things, but for federal
| spending: - $678 B, Social Security -
| $478 B, Medicare - $425 B, Net Interest - $419
| B, Health - $412 B, National Defense - $320 B,
| Income Security - $184 B, Veterans Benefits and
| Services - $75 B, Education, Training, Employment,
| and Social Services - $53 B, Transportation -
| $43 B, Administration of Justice - $15 B, Other
|
| https://fiscaldata.treasury.gov/americas-finance-
| guide/feder...
| fwip wrote:
| I think the common miscommunication here is that defense
| is the largest part of the US discretionary budget (about
| half overall), but that doesn't include those non-
| negotiable things like Social Security, Medicare, etc .
| actionfromafar wrote:
| Trump doesn't want to do Medicare etc anymore. The states
| can do that now.
| anon84873628 wrote:
| "Please note: Values displayed are outlays, which is
| money that is actually paid out by the government. Other
| sources, such as USAspending, may display spending as
| obligations, which is money that is promised to be paid,
| but may not yet be delivered."
|
| The Biden administration's FY2025 defense budget request
| was $850 billion for the DoD, with the total national
| security budget reaching over $895 billion. The FY2026
| proposal submitted by the Trump admin is 1.5 trillion for
| DoD.
| JKCalhoun wrote:
| Not all of those are discretionary spending? Maybe not
| equivalent to include, for example, Social Security.
| shimman wrote:
| It is relevant if you want to attack one of the greatest
| achievements of the new deal and hate working Americans.
| MichaelDickens wrote:
| People can have motivations for wanting to cut back
| Social Security other than "they hate working Americans".
| I would prefer commenters make more of an effort to
| understand their opponents' perspective rather than
| painting them in the worst light possible.
| PaulDavisThe1st wrote:
| Note there would be no veterans benefits and services
| without a military, so effectively the total for defense
| is 412 _PLUS_ 184 = $596B, more than anything except SS.
|
| Also note that most people consider social security to be
| an entirely different kind of government spending than
| anything else in that list.
| pembrook wrote:
| No, if the US had no military the majority of veterans
| benefits and services money would still need to be spent
| (its mostly healthcare) it would just be bucketed under
| SS and Medicare/Medicaid then.
|
| Also, without a military the US would not be even 1/3rd
| as wealthy as it is today, given its military created the
| global order that secured the last 80 years of the global
| economic system, shipping lanes and USD dominance. You
| can argue over specific wars/missions being dumb, but to
| pretend the overall ROI on that dominance enabling 80
| years of relatively peaceful global trade hasn't been
| positive is to be intellectually dishonest.
|
| The world is currently teetering on a global economic
| crisis over just ONE shipping lane not being fully open
| for a few weeks. Read more history and you'll see this
| used to be the norm.
| PaulDavisThe1st wrote:
| I avoided commenting on the ROI associated with defense
| spending, deliberately.
|
| Veterans get SS too, so no, costs associated with
| veterans wouldn't shift to SS. It is fair to suggest that
| the health care costs of uninjured, untraumatized
| veterans would just show up under Medicaid/Medicare. I
| don't know what percentage of veterans health care costs
| (not health care visits) fit in that category, versus
| "stuff that wouldn't be an issue if they hadn't been in
| the military".
| typeofhuman wrote:
| > LAPS every other budget category.
|
| Except for social security, health, medicare, debt interest
| icegreentea2 wrote:
| The absolute cost isn't the problem, it's the value that
| we're getting from it. SLS and Artemis are both incredibly
| expensive and ramshackle programs, and regardless of how bad
| the rest of the USG might be in terms of their cost, or
| value, if you are a true space fan and a true American space
| fan, you should want this little corner of humanity to hold
| itself to a higher standard.
|
| Acceptance of over costing and under delivering is exactly
| why the US is stuck with SpaceX as its prime space launch
| provider. It's only through the miracle of the vanity of
| billionaires that there's even a realistic second choice
| (Blue Origin) that might develop.
|
| It's also this type of attitude that let's us be in a
| situation where we honestly don't know how well the heat
| shield will work on reentry (SLS launches are so expensive,
| and so slow to build and prep to launch, that we cannot fit
| in a uncrewed mission between 1 and 2 to test or validate
| fixes or models).
|
| If Artemis as a program succeeds, it will be despite the
| incredible graft, pork, and ass covering, not because of it.
| I want Artemis to succeed because the achievement will be
| beautiful and amazing, and I want everyone to be safe and
| sound. I want Artemis to fail, to force a reckoning. I still
| believe that America has great things to offer to the world,
| but it's not going to be able to do that by muddling it's way
| through and cobbling together random pork filled programs
| into a vaguely inspiring shape.
| trothamel wrote:
| This is about to change.
|
| New NASA administrator Isaacman has redone the Artemis
| program. The changes were announced at the Ignition event a
| few weeks ago:
|
| https://www.nasa.gov/ignition/
|
| If you read one thing, read the sides on building the moon
| base:
|
| https://www.nasa.gov/wp-
| content/uploads/2026/03/2-building-t...
|
| The goals it to fly often - adding a SLS launch to 2027 and
| a second launch to 2028. This drops the cost-per-launch,
| which is mostly fixed. It redoes SLS to make it less
| expensive and more capable. It moves the lunar space
| station down to the surface of the moon.
|
| And it's budgeted at $10B/3 years, which fits into NASA's
| budget.
|
| Isaacman took the Artemis program and fixed it. The
| reckoning came, and it's looking good.
| icegreentea2 wrote:
| There's a lot of potential in the announced changes and
| what SLS/Artemis might be able to become. This shouldn't
| prevent us from being critical of what SLS/Artemis most
| definitely has been for the previous 10-15 years.
|
| And don't be fooled about the SLS launch cadence. As
| recently as summer 2025, Artemis III was still a
| nominally a 2027 manned lunar landing
| (https://www.nasa.gov/blogs/missions/2025/08/18/nasa-
| begins-p...). It got moved to a 2028 manned lunar landing
| in early 2026, before being converted back to a 2027
| manned test flight.
|
| The plan for SLS also does nothing to make it more
| capable (though hopefully less expensive). The cancelled
| exploration upper stage is being replaced by Centaur V,
| which is a less powerful stage. Isaacman refuses (I think
| rightfully) to really pin down on if there a future for
| SLS past Artemis V. If Isaacman chooses to cancel SLS
| after Artemis V (which I think is a defensible course of
| action), then SLS would represent a ~17 year long program
| that cost at least 41 billion dollars that netted 5
| mission launches.
|
| And characterizing it as "moving the lunar space station
| down to the surface of the moon" is... kinda falling into
| the trap. Lunar Gateway was supposed to launch ~2028
| (along with Artemis IV - from the era where Artemis III
| was the first lunar landing). Gateway was a gongshow, and
| was delayed, and now cancelled. And now the new plan says
| the habs (the part that people think as an actual
| base...) happens in Phase 3 starting in 2033. The sort
| term elements they are trying to reuse from gateway into
| near term (think ~4 years) base projects are very
| "ancillary".
|
| It remains unclear if NASA will infact be able to up the
| launch cadence of SLS to meet the double 2028 launch
| requirement. While it was clear that Gateway made... very
| limited sense for great expense, and the new plan is
| certainly ambitious with what I think is a stronger value
| proposition, it's also basically exactly as pie in the
| sky as gateway back in 2019.
|
| The fact that I am doubting NASA's ability to execute
| now, is the very cost of SLS (and friends).
| JumpCrisscross wrote:
| > _then SLS would represent a ~17 year long program that
| cost at least 41 billion dollars that netted 5 mission
| launches_
|
| SLS will never be worth it. But I'd discount from that
| price tag the continuity benefits of keeping the Shuttle
| folks around, and aerospace engineers employed, across
| the chasm years of the 2010s.
| ericd wrote:
| Yeah, it'd be really nice if we could somehow express the
| strategic capabilities maintained in these discussions.
| Because on the face of it, SLS looks terrible, but paying
| that much to maintain the national capability to make
| something like the shuttle and SRBs feels reasonable.
|
| Kind of similar to farm subsidies and the strategic
| implications there.
| thegrim33 wrote:
| >> is exactly why the US is stuck with SpaceX
|
| For the last 20 years NASA has intentionally run their
| Commercial Crew Program, which has the stated goal of
| developing/fostering/funding the development of commercial
| providers for launch vehicles.
|
| They, by plan they explicitly laid out and implemented,
| decided to rely on American commercial providers. And
| that's what they got. And in doing so, the program ended up
| producing the most prolific/successful launch vehicle in
| history.
|
| >> It's only through the miracle of the vanity of
| billionaires that there's even a realistic second choice
| (Blue Origin) that might develop
|
| Yes, this is another company which the NASA commercial
| program explicitly funded in order to get them to develop
| another launch vehicle.
| icegreentea2 wrote:
| SpaceX is an amazing success story, both as a commercial
| story, and as a story of government-industry cooperation.
| NASA should be proud and commended for fostering SpaceX.
|
| The question is why does SpaceX stand alone? Why did ULA
| stagnate? Why can't NG make SRBs that don't have nozzles
| that fall off? Why can't Betchel build a launch tower on
| time? What is it about government contracts in these
| other areas that led to all of this under performance?
|
| The US benefits by having SpaceX around. It would benefit
| even better by having many SpaceXs around.
|
| Oh, and also I believe it's generally understood that
| NASA provided very little funding for New Glenn. They
| gave BO a lot of money for HLS, but that's relatively
| recent (2023). New Glenn has been in the works since 2013
| and was mostly bankrolled by Bezos, with some USAF/DoD
| money kicked in.
| raspasov wrote:
| >>> SpaceX is an amazing success story
|
| 100%, and something that is underappreciated and often
| taken for granted nowadays, especially on our little
| forum here.
|
| >>> It would benefit even better by having many SpaceXs
| around.
|
| That made me chuckle, sounded to me a bit like "our house
| would benefit from having a few cats around". Perhaps the
| reason why there aren't too many SpaceX-like companies
| around is that it's truly among the hardest companies to
| ever create.
| komali2 wrote:
| If we're going to do public/private cooperation, we still
| need the whole competition thing.
|
| If we don't have it, either we're subject to monopoly, or
| just a State owned company, at which point, why not just
| cut out the middlemen and go full Nationalized?
| raspasov wrote:
| Boeing and others do complete in that area.
| dylan604 wrote:
| > Why did ULA stagnate?
|
| ULA is the old guard made from Lockheed and Boeing.
| SpaceX is the snappy upstart moving fast and breaking
| things. Having the freedom to fail with experiments is a
| totally different methodology from any failure seen as
| very bad. SpaceX has never been involved in loss of life.
| If they ever have that happen, I'd imagine they'd be
| forced to stop moving as fast and quit breaking things.
| LooseMarmoset wrote:
| Big space stagnated because they could. Their friends in
| Congress directed them lots of money and lots of
| political cover, and they both profited handsomely. Why
| would they change? They never had so, and I might argue
| that they still don't. Cost-plus contracts, years spent
| in expensive consulting and planning, all these mean they
| make money whether they go to space or not. Every five or
| six years, they trot out a "new" plan that purports to
| solve all the problems of the old plan, with exciting
| presentations and hired speakers, and the then-current
| administration sees a way to drum up political support,
| and the lobbyists and Congress see a way to make even
| more money and political favors.
|
| And now it's over 50 years since we last landed on the
| Moon.
| voidUpdate wrote:
| > Why can't NG make SRBs that don't have nozzles that
| fall off?
|
| To be fair, we just saw two of them work fine, with no
| nozzle fall-off-ages
| mr_toad wrote:
| > SLS launches are so expensive, and so slow to build and
| prep to launch, that we cannot fit in a uncrewed mission
| between 1 and 2 to test or validate fixes or models
|
| If they'd wanted to they could have launched an empty Orion
| crew module into LEO on another, cheaper, rocket and tested
| re-entry. The crew module by itself is less than ten
| tonnes.
| bregma wrote:
| How would they get it up to the required reentry speed
| for it to be a valid test? They already know the heat
| shield works for reentry at LEO speeds. That's not where
| the problems occur.
| selfmodruntime wrote:
| Compared to the absolute baffling amount of money spent for
| military purposes, knowing more about the moon is well
| worth it.
| palata wrote:
| No no no no, I can't let that go. Sending astronauts
| around the moon has _nothing to do_ with "knowing more
| about the moon". We don't need people up there to observe
| the moon. In fact, it's a lot easier and better to have
| sensors go there and automatically make measurements
| (e.g. pictures).
|
| Now thinking about Mars, sending astronauts there is
| actually a net negative for science because it risks
| contaminating Mars.
|
| We send astronauts there because it's cool, period.
| Science has nothing to do with it.
| 1shooner wrote:
| This FAQ from the NASA website seemed particularly
| intellectually dishonest:
|
| >Why do we need astronauts to view the Moon when we have
| robotic observers? Human eyes and brains are highly
| sensitive to subtle changes in color, texture, and other
| surface characteristics. Having astronaut eyes observe
| the lunar surface directly, in combination with the
| context of all the advances that scientists have made
| about the Moon over the last several decades, may uncover
| new discoveries and a more nuanced appreciation for the
| features on the surface of the Moon.
|
| https://www.nasa.gov/missions/nasa-answers-your-most-
| pressin...
| mathgeek wrote:
| The word "may" does a lot of heavy lifting in that
| sentence.
| monkpit wrote:
| > The US spends almost that much on net debt interest each
| day
|
| Spends, or accrues?
| bruckie wrote:
| Same thing (for now, at least). The U.S. has only defaulted
| a handful of times, none that I'm aware of since 1971.
| dogemaster2026 wrote:
| With $4 billion dollars CA Gov. Newsom can build about 0.27
| meter of light railing tracks and zero trains!
| pavon wrote:
| We spend more on debt interest than we spend on the military
| or anything really other than social security. That isn't a
| useful comparison anymore.
| sublinear wrote:
| The longer term value of having moon outposts for observation,
| mining, etc. will pay off massively.
|
| This is way bigger than just putting people on the moon or
| hubris. It's the prerequisite for everything we've also said
| about Mars. Elon just muddied the waters so much that people
| are so negative about anything else.
| chrismcb wrote:
| Ignoring the fact that we aren't using money for rocket fuel
| (that is people are benefitting from us spending that money)
| the potential upside is immense. There are a time of resources
| available in the asteroids and a moon base makes mining those
| resources easier and cheaper.
| moralestapia wrote:
| >we can still do hard things
|
| Absolutely! What do you have in mind?
| delta_p_delta_x wrote:
| > $4 billion per launch
|
| This is not a lot of money on a nation-state scale. It's equal
| to giving every person in the US about US$12.
| dogemaster2026 wrote:
| Newsom, Mamdani, please stay away.
| dbvn wrote:
| *taking* $12 from every person in the US... But I still think
| it's worth it.
| lostlogin wrote:
| > $4 billion per launch
|
| If Trump gets his $1.5T military budget, that would be about
| the military spend per day I think?
| jaspa99 wrote:
| And 9 hours of entitlement spend
| themafia wrote:
| > $4 billion per launch lol
|
| $1.3 billion for the mission hardware.
|
| $2.2 billion for the single use SLS.
|
| $0.5 billion for the launch pad.
|
| > watching people go back around the Moon
|
| Two of the missions were actually meant to land. One of them
| still may.
| jaspa99 wrote:
| Those $4 billion per launch are about 9 hours of entitlement
| spending (social security & health programs).
| shimman wrote:
| Why is entitlement spending bad? Do you think the government
| should only give welfare to corporations and not people?
| ge96 wrote:
| Wonder how it feels after being out there, seeing that, then
| coming back like alright back in the system I go.
| steve_adams_86 wrote:
| I imagine it depends a lot on your outlook. Someone could see
| the system as the thing that made the experience possible in
| the first place, and feel a lot of gratitude and a sense of
| possibility as a result.
| typeofhuman wrote:
| You might like this
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Overview_effect
| sph wrote:
| I can experience it just by watching these pictures, I cannot
| imagine how intense it must be for astronauts.
| ge96 wrote:
| It's a movie but I felt it in 2001 Space Odyssey when they
| show the transition of the bone to space exploration
|
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SpvOUnz4T7Q
| _august wrote:
| Are full size/larger images available somewhere? 1920x1280px
| seems low.
|
| Edit: Found 'em:
| https://images.nasa.gov/search?page=1&media=image&yearStart=...
| dylan604 wrote:
| The external shots seem to just be from the GoPro strapped to a
| solar panel. Didn't seen anything that looked like the shots
| from the Nikons onboard. Was hoping for a couple, but I know
| I'm just being greedy wanting all the pics
|
| edit: exif data shows some are from a Nikon. I just want to see
| them all!!! My greedy line still plays
| tharkun__ wrote:
| Hah! Funny how everyone here seems to be thinking the same:
| They said something about "finally 4k moon rocket images" and
| the stuff we got in the news was like blurry 800x600 type
| with lots of JPEG artifacts and such.
|
| Even the smallest resolution images I see in the link that
| the parent edited into their comment have better quality than
| what news outlets posted.
|
| I want TIFFs that takes ages to download and I need to scroll
| around in/zoom out on!
| dylan604 wrote:
| They will be posted when they get them. Right now, NASA
| doesn't have them because they're still on the SD cards in
| the capsule (probably been copied to their PCDs too).
| There's not a lot of bandwidth to be pushing large RAW
| files. They have to share the bandwidth with all of the
| telemetry and comms. They sent some small files down just
| to make some PR announcements and tease what will be
| coming.
| cruffle_duffle wrote:
| Coming soon to the moon near you: starlink!
| adrianpike wrote:
| There's supposed to be a 260 megabit link:
| https://www.nasa.gov/goddard/esc/o2o/
|
| Maybe it's not operating as described yet?
| consp wrote:
| Doesn't that require line of sight with limited receivers
| available? Maybe the current positioning is preventing it
| until the constellation changes. With the constellation
| that is the craft in respect to the two ground stations
| in a narrow patch of the US. I could not find anything
| about throughput rates except for the theoretical maximum
| but I also suspect that max is only in LEO.
| adrian_b wrote:
| It is operating only when it can be pointed towards
| Earth, while also avoiding the Sun, which did not happen
| during the flyby.
|
| The laser is on one side of Orion, and when that side is
| not oriented towards Earth for various reasons, the
| optical communications cannot be used.
|
| For continuous communications, at least when there is no
| interposed body, like the Moon, multiple lasers located
| around Orion would be needed to ensure coverage. When by
| the far side of the Moon, a relay orbiting around the
| Moon would be needed.
| em-bee wrote:
| i heard mention of 100 megabit. they downloaded 50GB of
| data the night after the flyby. they probably keep
| downloading as much as they can. and they still need to
| sift through all that to find the pictures worth
| publishing. they could do a data dump, but that's not
| interesting for the general public. the stuff is coming.
| slowly.
| niek_pas wrote:
| Maybe you're being impatient, but I don't think you're being
| greedy. This is a publicly funded project. I'd say those
| photos belong in the public domain. Which they are.
| aanet wrote:
| I was hoping that they used a medium format camera like
| Hasselblad or something for the larger pics... but no such
| luck. I guess weight might have been one factor.
|
| Still, the pics are mind blowing. Out of this world, tbh
| dylan604 wrote:
| A 20.8 megapixel 5568 x 3712 pixels is not a shitty image.
| When we get to see those images, they will be much better
| than the GoPro images we're seeing
| adrian_b wrote:
| Some nice images with this resolution of the far side of
| the Moon have already been posted.
| jiggawatts wrote:
| They also have a 46 megapixel Nikon Z9 which they don't
| appear to have used for some odd reason...
| sorz wrote:
| I found one taken with Z9:
| https://images.nasa.gov/details/art002e009301
|
| There are some very bright noise pixels on the dark area,
| which is different from the noise in similar photos taken
| with D5 (much darker and uniform).
| jiggawatts wrote:
| A common error made with "pixel peeping" is to zoom to
| 1:1, which shows a smaller physical sensor area with
| higher megapixel cameras.
|
| The trick is to zoom to the same percentage zoom and
| compare side-by-side.
|
| I did spot a few "hot" pixels visible on the Moon, but
| those are easily fixed in post.
| RogerL wrote:
| it was light gathering. the D5 they brought is a very old
| camera tech wise, but it was ideal for the low light photos
| of the eclipse. they also brought a Z9 for much higher
| resolution photos.
| spartanatreyu wrote:
| And my screensaver folder grows larger...
| cbhl wrote:
| To be fair they "only" have a 20 Mbps laser uplink from the
| capsule to Earth, and that's shared between all the systems and
| uploading images/video.
| hyperbovine wrote:
| 260Mbps? https://www.nasa.gov/goddard/esc/o2o/
| _moof wrote:
| "Uplink" means Earth to spacecraft. Spacecraft to Earth is
| downlink.
| ChrisMarshallNY wrote:
| Try this: https://www.flickr.com/photos/nasa2explore/
|
| I don't see TIFFs, so I assume the originals were JPEG.
| cguess wrote:
| If anything the originals would be RAW files.
| ChrisMarshallNY wrote:
| Maybe they were RAW + JPEG. That's fairly common.
|
| Could be, we see TIFFs, after they get back.
| xiaoyu2006 wrote:
| I believe those are taken largely with Nikon z9?
| ChrisMarshallNY wrote:
| D5. Old Skool.
|
| I think they are specially modified for use in space.
| gnabgib wrote:
| Both
|
| Z9 - last minute flight add
| (https://www.flickr.com/photos/nasa2explore/55194523579/)
|
| D5 - two of them
| (https://www.flickr.com/photos/nasa2explore/55194768276/)
|
| GoPro HERO4 - Some (4?) on the solar
| (https://www.flickr.com/photos/nasa2explore/55193566011/)
|
| iPhone 17 Pro Max - Although, one failed the first day
| (https://www.flickr.com/photos/nasa2explore/55193337359/)
| farmerbb wrote:
| It looks like changing the `~large` in the image filename to
| `~orig` gets you the full size versions.
| modeless wrote:
| Thanks, these make some kickass ultrawide wallpapers.
| gasi wrote:
| You can view them in full resolution here:
| https://zoomhub.net/showcase/photography/nasa
| foobarbecue wrote:
| Should eventually be on pds atlas I hope. https://pds-
| imaging.jpl.nasa.gov/
| beaconfield wrote:
| thank you
| drfloyd51 wrote:
| The solar eclipse pictures are absolutely beautiful.
| sph wrote:
| I shared some of these pictures with family members that hadn't
| even heard of Artemis, and one asked if the blue thing was Mars.
| I am shook.
| ramesh31 wrote:
| There needs to be a word for that feeling of dread you get when
| reminded of just how feeble and weak the average human mind is,
| and how tenuous of a grasp on reality most people have.
| sho_hn wrote:
| Maybe I'm an eternal optimist, but sounds to me like they
| actually tried to put themselves into space, made the
| assumption that anything visible past the moon must be further
| out and were left with "wait, I thought it was supposed to be
| red?"
|
| Uninformed, but not ignorant and perhaps even interested. I
| hope your response started with "No, actually, even cooler:
| ..." and you made a space fan that day.
| dboreham wrote:
| I'd be genuinely curious to see a list of the things they had
| heard of, since Artemis has been in the news constantly for a
| month. E.g. have they just not heard of anything (consume no
| news), or are they in some news silo that excludes rockets, and
| if so what other things does it include? We may be missing
| something important that we've never heard of!
| dylan604 wrote:
| It just goes to show how normal space flight is compared to
| the Apollo era. All the way up to Apollo 11, people stopped
| what they were doing to watch. Apollo 13 grabbed some
| attention with the near disaster. The first Shuttle missions
| were watched, but people quickly lost interest. Even this
| going back to the moon was nothing new to the average person.
| When people claim it was all over the news seems like someone
| in an echo chamber. It might have been in your news feeds,
| but I doubt it was as predominate as you might think. If your
| "news" feed is nothing but influencers and celebrities, then
| NASA probably never even interrupts their feeds
| cruffle_duffle wrote:
| These things are so damn cool!
| jflessau wrote:
| Just wanted to say how moving I find these pictures. Proof of
| what humanity is capable of :)
| suzzer99 wrote:
| I hope they listened to Dark Side of the Moon on the flyby.
| arduanika wrote:
| Matter of fact, it's all dark.
| ahazred8ta wrote:
| It can be any colour you like.
| mememememememo wrote:
| Luckily the far side of the moon wasn't the dark side of the
| moon on this trip.
| NooneAtAll3 wrote:
| it mostly was, it looks like
|
| it's full moon
| Almondsetat wrote:
| We're so not accustomed to moon pictures taken with "normal"
| cameras. These almost look like 3D renders to me, it's incredible
| dylan604 wrote:
| Why is normal in quotes? Do you mean visible light vs filtered
| monochrome with false-color outputs or infrared/radio/x-ray
| like some other telescopes use? Would that be the abnormal you
| are referring? The Apollo images were taken with Hasselblad
| film cameras that were "normal" cameras[0].
|
| [0]https://www.hasselblad.com/about/history/hasselblad-in-
| space...
| oliyoung wrote:
| I think they mean "consumer" or "off the shelf" as opposed to
| "custom build for the mission", we've seen iPhone and GoPro
| photos
| dylan604 wrote:
| What's custom built? They're using stock Nikon bodies, and
| as you've said iPhone and GoPros. Where's the confusion?
| linzhangrun wrote:
| They shot these pictures using the Nikon D5, Z9, as well as
| iPhone and GoPro.
| dylan604 wrote:
| I understand what cameras were used. I'm asking why normal
| was in quotes. What else would there have been?
| mememememememo wrote:
| A camera you can order on Amazon in the next 5 minutes
| asimovDev wrote:
| I am curious to see how being namedropped by NASA affects
| the sales of these cameras. It's probably not as much as I
| am imagining but still not an insignificant number.
| Probably less than Nutella that accidentally flew off the
| shelf live on stream straight across the shot
| madrox wrote:
| There is something uncanny about the bandwidth and quality of all
| the artifacts coming from this mission.
|
| I've subsisted on photos from the Apollo missions and artistic
| renditions for so long that seeing the modern, high resolution
| real thing to be quite stirring in a way I didn't expect. It
| actually does make me believe that the future could be quite
| cool.
| poszlem wrote:
| Yeah, I think we got so accustomed to that analog look that
| seeing them like this feels almost like viewing a World War I
| photo in full color and 4K.
| dylan604 wrote:
| We haven't even seen the full quality images yet. They've
| commented that the live feed from the GoPro is a limited
| bandwidth because they have to share the bandwidth with running
| the capsule. The images from the Nikons onboard are just scaled
| down. My initial guess was from an export specifically to get
| an early dump to get everyone on the ground chomping at the bit
| something to see. They'll get the full images when the SD cards
| splash down. When those are released, I'm expecting quite a few
| OMG images
| madrox wrote:
| That's really exciting!
| zamadatix wrote:
| I wouldn't mind some raw files but I honestly don't think
| they'll be too strikingly different than these (make sure
| you're looking at the full 20 MP images which should be
| several MB, not the 2 MP previews at ~200 KB).
| geerlingguy wrote:
| The raw files have a ton more dynamic range, however. You
| could pull out a lot more detail in shadows.
| dylan604 wrote:
| I don't know what the Lightroom* skillz of the astronauts
| are, but I would not be surprised if they were shooting
| RAW+JPEG and only processed the JPGs in Lightroom. They
| probably had presets to export to smaller images that was
| created months ago and loaded onto their PCDs. I'd imagine
| 4 humans in a tincan have more things to do than to be
| developing RAW images by digging out the details in the
| shadows, push the exposure and pull back the highlights,
| and then apply all of those settings to each sequence of
| images. They'll let the folks on the ground do that.
|
| * The exif data has Adobe Lightroom Classic (Windows)
| metadata in it.
| zamadatix wrote:
| In that case with the metadata I wonder if the astronauts
| already sent the raw files over the laser link and the
| images were just processed by the ground staff for
| posting on the site.
| kube-system wrote:
| I cannot wait until we get 4k video of people walking on the
| surface, kicking up dust.
| Gagarin1917 wrote:
| The existing 16mm film from Apollo is roughly equivalent to
| 2K, and you can see dust kicked up pretty nicely!
| sgt wrote:
| Where can we see that in high quality? Generally if I look
| at YouTube it's compressed and poor quality.
| philistine wrote:
| They never shot 16mm film on the moon. They had weird tv
| cameras and took photos in 35mm.
| Gagarin1917 wrote:
| Sure they did. Here's some footage:
|
| https://youtu.be/7o3Oi9JWsyM
| philistine wrote:
| Oh that's what the silent footage was! So sorry!
| aksss wrote:
| Space monkeys, moon pirates, and a Starbucks in the moon mall.
| JumpCrisscross wrote:
| > _something uncanny about the bandwidth and quality of all the
| artifacts coming from this mission_
|
| Back in 2019, Robert Zubrin suggested using rovers "to do
| detailed photography of the [Moon] base area and its
| surroundings" to "ultimately form the basis of a virtual
| reality experience that will allow millions of members of the
| public to participate vicariously in the missions" [1].
|
| [1] https://spacenews.com/op-ed-lunar-gateway-or-moon-direct/
| selfmodruntime wrote:
| I agree 100%. Seeing the picture of the backside of the moon
| with the earth in view really drove home that the moon really
| is just a large rock.
| JumpCrisscross wrote:
| > _the moon really is just a large rock_
|
| It really is surprising being able to see the Moon isn't
| spherical. (Are those abberations?) It makes sene, given the
| moon isn't in hydrostatic equilibrium.
| bregma wrote:
| > backside of the moon
|
| I think perhaps you mean the far side of the moon. The
| "backside" of the moon implies a large graben stretching
| almost from pole to pole, and I have seen no evidence of such
| a geological formation in any photos.
| selfmodruntime wrote:
| thanks, I audibly laughed
| TripleTree wrote:
| What? The Apollo photos were with extremely high quality
| cameras on film. They're incredibly high resolution.
| LorenDB wrote:
| I think my favorite of all these images is
| https://www.nasa.gov/image-detail/amf-art002e009287/. The sheer
| size difference, while simply a trick of perspective, makes Earth
| feel tiny and insignificant.
| andrewstuart2 wrote:
| Yeah, gives me very similar vibes to the famous "pale blue
| dot."
| aanet wrote:
| Some of my favs:
|
| 1. The moon eclipsed, with the Orion capsule (outside POV, from
| GoPro) - https://images-
| assets.nasa.gov/image/art002e009567/art002e00...
|
| 2. The moon eclipsed, with the Orion capsule, and Earth
| crescent (outside POV, from GoPro) - https://images-
| assets.nasa.gov/image/art002e009567/art002e00...
|
| 3. Crescent Moon, Crescent Earth (my fav!!) "A New View of the
| Moon" - https://images-
| assets.nasa.gov/image/art002e009287/art002e00...
|
| 4. Artemis II in Eclipse (new fav!) - https://images-
| assets.nasa.gov/image/art002e009301/art002e00...
| Deebster wrote:
| I think your first link should be to https://images-
| assets.nasa.gov/image/art002e009566/art002e00...
| asimovDev wrote:
| If you stare at the picture, there's an illusion of the shadow
| growing and enveloping the moon further. At least for me. Quite
| neat. Might be something about the eyes focusing on the dark
| part of the photo?
| cdelsolar wrote:
| My favorite too.. one of the most awe-inspiring pictures I've
| ever seen.
| dylan604 wrote:
| I listened to pretty much the entire fly by yesterday, and I was
| imagining how I would have spent my time at the windows with a
| camera. Listening to the comms made me think of that episode from
| From The Earth to the Moon where they take the astronauts out and
| give them geology lessons so they could be more productive with
| their descriptions.
|
| I was also very curious of their descriptions during the eclipse
| where the Earth shine was lighting up the dark side of the moon
| to such a surreal look they couldn't really describe it. They
| were even commenting that they didn't feel the photos being taken
| were doing it justice either.
|
| I also was wondering if they will make any modifications to the
| capsule since covering a window to block the Earth shine caused
| concern on the ground from some of the readings they were
| getting. Assuming it was overheating as they redirected air flow
| to the window. Then again, the following missions won't be so
| concerned with a single fly by so probably not something they'll
| address.
| jrmg wrote:
| It was amazing listening to it in real time.
|
| If I had any doubt about crewed missions, this Artemis moon
| flyby is extinguishing them.
|
| Hearing the crew discussing observations with Mission Control,
| moving cameras around, describing what they see, reacting to
| events and to curiosity and changing what they're doing
| accordingly. And obviously just SO EXCITED to be doing it all.
| It was just amazing.
|
| They're still live streaming. It's not as exciting anymore -
| 'just' on the way home now - but you can just put it on in the
| background and experience a tiny bit of what it's like to be in
| the capsule. They're exercising right now.
|
| https://www.youtube.com/live/m3kR2KK8TEs
| spike021 wrote:
| I've been trying to keep the 24 hour stream on in the
| background as often as possible. Some of it is silly but it
| just feels exciting to be able to partake in the experience
| remotely like this.
| hydrogen7800 wrote:
| >that episode from From The Earth to the Moon where they take
| the astronauts out and give them geology lessons so they could
| be more productive with their descriptions.
|
| My favorite episode of the series and I was thinking of it
| during Integrity's flyby.
| wishfish wrote:
| Zoomed into several of the lunar surface photos and noticed some
| of the very small impact craters are in a regularly spaced
| straight line.
|
| Looks to me as if a meteorite came in at a shallow angle and
| basically skipped across the surface. Leaving dimpled craters as
| it bounced. Looks very similar to rocks skipping on a pond. Am I
| correct or is there another explanation for these?
| xnx wrote:
| A chain of meteors would strike the surface in a line as the
| moon moves
| ninkendo wrote:
| A single "rubble pile" asteroid will easily break apart when
| nearing a celestial body, once it crosses the Roche limit. It
| will break apart into a perfectly straight line too (at least
| the impact craters will.) I would guess most of the straight-
| line series of craters are all caused by something like this.
| kQq9oHeAz6wLLS wrote:
| Strafing fire from an alien warship will leave similar
| craters, assuming sufficiently large kinetic energy
| weapons.
| maccam912 wrote:
| If I am understanding correctly you are seeing
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crater_chain which are craters
| caused by debris blasted out when another crater is formed.
| wishfish wrote:
| Thank you! Glad to see there's a Wikipedia article about it.
| And good to learn the formal name for this formation:
| "catena" (plural "catenae").
| balajeekalyan wrote:
| Really cool! Artemis III will be even more breathtaking I think
| https://www.nasa.gov/mission/artemis-iii/
| joemi wrote:
| I started rewatching For All Mankind a week or so before the
| Artemis II launch, so it's been pretty wild to watch an alt-
| history about people going to and settling on the Moon and Mars,
| and then to see real life people just starting to return to the
| Moon at the same time.
| PedroBatista wrote:
| Very cool pictures, especially those ones backlit by the Sun are
| something new. ie real photos that we usually only see in sci-fi
| games or movies.
|
| But the real question is: Who of those 4 clogged up the toilet?
| That's what the public demands to know.
| aosaigh wrote:
| I cannot fathom what it must be like to witness this in-person.
| The pictures are spectacular but to spend time experiencing it
| outside the window in your proximity must be overwhelming in the
| most incredible way.
| SegfaultSeagull wrote:
| Can someone ELI5 how it is one side of the moon is never seen on
| Earth? The moon orbits and also rotates, does it not?
| written-beyond wrote:
| The moon is tidally locked to earth, we only ever see one side.
| kshacker wrote:
| Is it 2-way? I guess moon see all around earth, or no?
| johnwalkr wrote:
| If you are on the near side of the moon[1], you will always
| see Earth see around Earth as it rotates and as the moon
| orbits it. You will also see it in different phases, like
| how we see lunar phases from Earth. If you are on the far
| side of the moon, you will not see Earth at all as you will
| always be facing away from it.
|
| [1] The Earth does move in the moon's sky a bit. If you are
| on the near side but getting close to the far side, the
| Earth will be below the horizon sometimes.
| eterm wrote:
| Consider what it'd mean if there were parts of the Earth
| that could not be seen from the moon, it would also mean
| those locations could never themselves see the moon.
|
| Ignoring the orbital period implications, I think it'd be
| bigger news if either US or Europe, or Asia couldn't ever
| actually see the moon.
| kshacker wrote:
| This is the best ELI5 explanation I have heard. Thanks !
| JdeBP wrote:
| It may one day be, far in the future, although that's
| predicted to be so far off that Sol might have become a red
| giant by then, making the issue moot.
|
| But only Luna is tidally locked at the moment. Terra is
| not, and its rotation still has a long way to slow down
| before it becomes so.
| Georgelemental wrote:
| To add: this happens because the parts of the Moon that are
| closer to the Earth are pulled in more by Earth's gravity,
| compared to the ones further away.
| fh973 wrote:
| The missing piece of information: the moon is not perfectly
| sphere shaped, the bulge has more mass, and is attracted by
| the earth more.
| willis936 wrote:
| The gravitational pull of the moon lifts up the ocean to cause
| tides. Well the Earth's gravitational pull is so strong on the
| moon that the heavier side of the moon always faces the Earth.
| This is called tidal locking. So the only way to ever see the
| far side of the moon is to go there. Humans have gone there
| before, but almost always during an Earth "full moon", which
| means the far side is unlit. We do have full images of the far
| side of the moon from remote probes, but the 21% of the far
| side that was lit had human eyes on it for the first time ever.
| grishka wrote:
| But why does this _not_ happen to planets themselves in
| relation to the sun?
| anlsh wrote:
| I think the explanation is wrong: wikipedia offers a
| completely different explanation
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tidal_locking.
|
| Planets can become tidally locked to the sun- mercury is.
| Probably the timescale required for the other planets is
| just much longer
|
| EDIT: Apparently mercury _isn 't_ actually tidally locked
| to the sun, TIL
| willis936 wrote:
| I don't see how my ELI5 disagrees with the wikipedia
| article.
| _moof wrote:
| Moons get tidally locked because they're very close to
| their planet, so the planet's gravity is by far the
| strongest influence.
|
| The planets have much more complicated gravitational
| interactions because in addition to the Sun's gravity, they
| influence each other. So you end up with things like
| orbital resonances instead.
|
| A planet that's close to its star and far from other strong
| gravitational influences will tidally lock to the star.
| SilverElfin wrote:
| Yes and its rotation is synchronized to earth. See the
| animation at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tidal_locking
| nirav72 wrote:
| thanks, that's probably the best animation I've seen
| explaining a tidal locked moon.
| ijidak wrote:
| I believe it's caused by even the slightest imbalance in mass.
| Because the moon is so close to Earth, the imbalance causes
| gravity to be slightly stronger on one side than the other
| side. Eventually, that leads to no rotation at all.
|
| I imagine most bodies rotating around a second object will
| eventually lose their angular velocity.
| NooneAtAll3 wrote:
| > The moon orbits and also rotates, does it not?
|
| and one cancels the other, yes
| _moof wrote:
| It's because Earth pulls on the bulge in the Moon created by
| Earth's gravity.
|
| It has to do with the tides. Except in this case it isn't ocean
| tides - it's lunar tides. Just as the Moon's gravity creates a
| bulge in Earth's oceans, Earth's gravity creates a bulge in the
| material that makes up the moon.
|
| If Earth and the Moon didn't rotate, the bulges would "point"
| directly at the other body. But with rotation, the tidal bulge
| is a little bit offset in the direction of rotation. And the
| Moon used to rotate.
|
| That offset creates a torque. Earth's gravity tries to pull the
| bulge into perfect alignment. Over time this slows the rotation
| of the moon until it stopped rotating at all.
|
| (Technically the Moon does rotate, but it does so at the same
| rate that it orbits Earth. So it doesn't rotate from our
| perspective.)
| theodorethomas wrote:
| One consequence of that is that the Earth, as seen from the
| nearside of the Moon's surface, just hangs there, never moving,
| apart from a small wobble.
| irickt wrote:
| This is the best animation of the trajectory I've seen:
| https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap260406.html
| pkaye wrote:
| Someone did a nice animation on YouTube.
|
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PNQ7MoL7erI
| sandos wrote:
| I really liked this video! Orbits are hard to visualize but I
| think the choices here were very good.
| geokon wrote:
| It's interesting that the flights are not timed for when the
| moon is in the magnetosphere shadow. As far as I could gather
| it seems they're intentionally exposing astronauts to more
| radiation to test equipment (maybe with an eye to future Mars
| missions?). Hard to get hard details from all the press release
| fluffy
|
| https://www.nesdis.noaa.gov/news/noaas-space-weather-mission...
| matheusmoreira wrote:
| https://images.nasa.gov/details/art002e009286
|
| Stunning!
| cogogo wrote:
| Are the bright spots to the lower right in this photo galaxies or
| just camera artifacts[0]? Unreal photo either way.
|
| [0]https://images-
| assets.nasa.gov/image/art002e009301/art002e00...
| dylan604 wrote:
| They said they were able to see a few planets during the
| eclipse. I know they definitely saw Mars as they were
| discussing the red color. They saw Venus which was visible in
| the live feed from the GoPro on the solar panel. IIRC, they
| were thinking Saturn would have been visible. My guess is the
| really bright dots are planets. It looks like some horrendous
| compression artifacts along with some possible lens distortion.
| My exif app says no exif data in the jpg you linked. Did you
| come to that image from their website that provides the EXIF to
| see what lens it was? Nothing looks like a galaxy in the image
| to me.
|
| Edit: After further looking and some zooming into it, I'd say
| the bright dot closest to the moon is Venus, the next one has a
| red tint making it Mars, and then the last one would be Saturn
| with the rings. There might be a couple of galaxies in the
| upper left corner. I was quick to dismiss and blame on
| compression. The benefits of not having to shoot through
| atmosphere. I wouldn't have expected that detail in what I'm
| assuming to be a fairly fast exposure
| cogogo wrote:
| Appreciate the detailed response. I think it would be a
| borderline miraculous photo if they are planets aligned in
| that way. Zooming they look more like artifacts or galaxies
| to me. I spend a good amount of time looking at planets from
| earth through binoculars and even with an atmosphere they
| resolve better than that.
| dylan604 wrote:
| I'm pretty sure I'm right about the planets. The planets
| are aligned that way. If you're experienced looking at them
| with binocs, you should be aware of that. The line the
| planets are on is known as the ecliptic.
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ecliptic
|
| Also, if you look at the famous family portrait, you'll see
| they're in a pretty straight line as well
|
| https://science.nasa.gov/resource/first-ever-solar-system-
| fa...
| Deebster wrote:
| There is EXIF available in the original version:
| https://images-
| assets.nasa.gov/image/art002e009301/art002e00...
|
| It's taken with an AF Nikkor 35mm f/2D on a NIKON Z 9.
| nfg wrote:
| From left to right: Saturn, Mars and Mercury.
| neverkn0wsb357 wrote:
| I wish they would've flown by and taken a picture of the Apollo
| 11 lunar landing site.
|
| I think it would've been a super cool throwback to the history of
| lunar exploration; maybe it's just me but I think it would've
| been really exciting. It would basically be the like visiting a
| UNESCO (moon?) heritage site.
| CookieTonsure wrote:
| The main point of the voyage was to see the far side, and also
| to report on previously-unseen portions of the Moon that hadn't
| really had human coverage in the past.
|
| Since all the Apollo landings were on the near-side of the
| Moon, they were in fact less accessible to this crew.
|
| My disappointment lay chiefly in their L.O.S. periods, because
| in 2026 why does Earth lack operational satellites that could
| relay comms from the other side? Or a space optical/radio
| telescope that would benefit massively from the darkness and
| shielding of a Moon-sized body? No humans necessary for that.
| Of course, you couldn't power such a craft with solar power...
| dylan604 wrote:
| > because in 2026 why does Earth lack operational satellites
| that could relay comms from the other side?
|
| The moon is not an easy body to orbit. Keeping something in
| orbit around the moon requires a lot of station keeping which
| requires a lot of fuel. Once that fuel runs out, the orbit
| will not be stable. People have talked about trying an Earth-
| Moon L2 point, but that's not as stable as Sun-Earth L2 where
| things like JWST are located.
| _moof wrote:
| Mostly because there's been very little US activity on the
| Moon to justify it. Orbiting the Moon can also be a pain -
| its gravitational field is "lumpy" - but you can manage that
| by making your orbit bigger (higher). See this paper if
| you're interested in details as they pertain to the Lunar
| Reconnaissance Orbiter, which has been flying since 2009: htt
| ps://ntrs.nasa.gov/api/citations/20070035736/downloads/20...
|
| China has a lunar comm relay IIRC, to support some surface
| operations on the far side.
| rootusrootus wrote:
| They would have needed a hell of a lot more camera for that,
| right? Even the best DSLR with the best lens is going to have a
| lot of trouble resolving something that small at over 4000
| miles.
| dylan604 wrote:
| That's a detail a lot of people miss. Apollo missions orbited
| at ~150 miles above the moon while Artemis II fly-by was much
| further away. That was by design to specifically give them
| the wider view to see things missed by Apollo's closer orbits
| ggm wrote:
| odd they don't do a carousel. I get that it's not necessary and
| minimalism has a joy of it's own, but click-through would be
| useful.
| ashton314 wrote:
| Amaze, amaze, amaze!
|
| Loved the _Project Hail Mary_ quote from one of the mission
| controllers. :)
|
| This bright spot in world news has been good for my mental health
| and general motivation. Thank you NASA!
| cmos wrote:
| What a trip. They must all be so excited!
|
| I hope they will come back as ambassadors of peace.
| linzhangrun wrote:
| The best camera position for landscape photography. Well done.
| gasi wrote:
| I built a zoomable collection viewer for all NASA Artemis II +
| Apollo 8 gallery images at their full original resolutions--
| nearly 2 gigapixels across 104 images. Spanning 1968 Earthrise to
| 2026 Earthset:
|
| https://zoomhub.net/showcase/photography/nasa
|
| Try different layouts with L (grid, masonry, spiral, etc.),
| filter by gallery or camera, WASD/Q/E/Tab to navigate.
| NooneAtAll3 wrote:
| I've been thoroughly disappointed in NASA's handling of "public
| relations" part of the mission
|
| every significant achievement point became a publicity stunt of
| lowest quality, with forced line reads and little practicality
|
| I'm eagerly awaiting future engineering challenges and science
| results - but I'd want NASA to concentrate on that first, and
| farce show-making second
| dylan604 wrote:
| At one point, they were telling NASA that they didn't have the
| right words or enough superlatives. I kept waiting for them to
| quote Contact with "should have sent a poet"
| boguscoder wrote:
| There's something off about gps coordinates in EXIF data
| kooshball wrote:
| which photo has gps in the EXIF?
| nsim wrote:
| What is the licence on these images? I can't seen anything on the
| site or in the HTML.
|
| I've been waiting for a new Earth Rise/Set shot (which is
| thankfully at least 5568x3712px from a NIKON D5).
|
| Edit: https://www.nasa.gov/nasa-brand-center/images-and-media/
|
| > You may use this material for educational or informational
| purposes, including photo collections, textbooks, public
| exhibits, computer graphical simulations and Internet Web pages.
| modeless wrote:
| Works of the US government are not copyrighted.
| habinero wrote:
| There is none, they're automatically public domain.
| _moof wrote:
| Mostly true. There are some restrictions on images containing
| NASA logos or NASA employees, for example.
| https://www.nasa.gov/nasa-brand-center/images-and-media/
| mathgeek wrote:
| Only the ones not containing the NASA logo or the astronauts
| are public domain.
| html5cat wrote:
| It's a bit tricky to navigate between all the amazing photos NASA
| Artemis crew captured so I vibe coded (Codex) a simple site with
| full screen full res view and arrow navigation:
|
| https://nasa.puma.tech
|
| feedback welcome
| suzzer99 wrote:
| That's awesome. Since you asked for feedback, can you vibecode
| up a thumbnail view? Also I see a bunch more images on the NASA
| site. How are you pulling them?
| html5cat wrote:
| yeah, this was a one time sync. which source do you prefer
| for full list? and for thumbnail view, would you like a T
| shortcut or any other button?
| spike021 wrote:
| this is really helpful. such beautiful photos.
| asimovDev wrote:
| Gorgeous, awe-inspiring photos.
|
| Tangentially, did the NASA website move to WordPress? I thought
| it was Drupal, the Drupal official website even had a case study
| about nasa.gov. I see wp-content links on the site and there is
| no Drupal behaviors in JavaScript and I didn't notice any of the
| usual drupal classes in the source
| sha-3 wrote:
| NASA migrated thousands(!) of their sites to WordPress back in
| 2023. I think it had to do with user-friendliness of the
| Gutenberg editor.
| sachahjkl wrote:
| what about a video ?
| hulitu wrote:
| > Lunar Flyby
|
| I though they were going _to the moon_, not "flyby".
|
| NASA is a pale reminiscent of its former self. Sad.
| _moof wrote:
| This is a new vehicle, and this is a test flight to work out
| the kinks before attempting a landing. It's exactly the same
| way Apollo was done. Go read about Apollo 8.
| voidUpdate wrote:
| They're "going to the moon" in the same way that going to the
| drive-through is "going to mcdonalds". I think NASA is still as
| good as it was, they just don't have unlimited "beat the
| soviets" budget anymore
| shafyy wrote:
| God, they must have hated being forced to speak to the president
| voidUpdate wrote:
| Some of these photos look so "fake". Maybe because of how they
| are lit or the lack of atmospheric distortion, they don't quite
| looks real (I'm not disputing that they are authentic, they just
| look a bit weird)
| tokai wrote:
| Its a classic feeling when seeing things there one not normally
| see. There's a whole conspiracy that the war in Ukraine is
| fake, because video of combat looks weird compared to movies
| and video games.
| pavon wrote:
| Yeah, it is common for pictures in space to look like
| simplistic raytraced renderings because the lighting and
| shadows are so sharp, lacking atmospheric diffusion and
| scattering.
| juleiie wrote:
| I am really worried about their return entry. I got emotionally
| invested in the crew, meanwhile there have been voices saying
| Orion's heat shield is made of garbagium and tested with
| undergrad level simplistic physics models.
|
| Then I read about the NASA administrator being some sort of
| "charisma" bravado guy and the government pressures to get to the
| moon during Trump presidency.
|
| How NASA safety standards are somehow 1/10 of the ones they
| impose on external private companies who would never be allowed
| to do crew launch with that kind of level of risk.
|
| I think I am just going to forget about it for now until I hear
| about hopefully safe return in mainstream news so I don't end up
| with heart attack. They really should take mainly single people
| without families on these missions imo.
| LLLDP wrote:
| Surpassing Apollo 13's distance record after so many decades is
| kind of wild. It really shows how infrequent deep-space human
| missions have been, despite all the progress in other areas.
| zkmon wrote:
| Was there any writeup on the actual goals and accomplishments of
| this mission. I'm sure there is some very valuable scientif8c
| data and observations done, but what exactly are those (other
| than 'wow' media)?
| spanjer wrote:
| Getting the public excited also has its place. Also sending
| humans so far from earth has enough challenges to make it
| worthwile. Wikipedia (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Artemis_II)
| has the experiments listed.
| zkmon wrote:
| > sending humans so far ...
|
| I see that they travelled 1.6% more distance compared to a
| tech that was used 56 years ago. If NASA is really excited
| about this, I think they are having a low news day. I'm sure
| they must be other goals.
| pknerd wrote:
| From Google AI Review:
|
| > No, the Artemis II mission will not land on the moon. It is a
| 10-day crewed, deep-space flyby test flight designed to verify
| spacecraft systems before future landing missions. The crew will
| circle the moon before returning to Earth, serving as a critical
| step toward landing later in the decade.
|
| Don't get mad at me. My question is, why did we have to send this
| mission? This is not the first time we are going to land on the
| moon, so why this prerequisite?
| assimpleaspossi wrote:
| To come up to speed and see what still works and what doesn't.
| To try out the new stuff.
| tw1984 wrote:
| honest question - why any talented people would still work for
| NASA when real projects are from companies like spacex?
| infinity_logesh wrote:
| Amazing ! looks cool!
| sethammons wrote:
| > that's no moon.
|
| https://www.flickr.com/photos/nasa2explore/55194334756/
|
| This is an amazing image.
| dcchambers wrote:
| The eclipse photos are absolutely jaw-dropping.
| soci wrote:
| We already have images from the far side of the moon since the
| 2009's Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter [1].
|
| In theory, LRO is currently flying at lower orbit than Artemis I
| mission [2]. Shouldn't the LRO images be better? Maybe NASA has
| not disclosed all images?
|
| Honest question: why the hype with these pictures?
|
| [1] https://svs.gsfc.nasa.gov/4109
|
| [2] Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO) -> ~50 km vs. Artemis I ->
| ~129 km
| syncsynchalt wrote:
| It's the difference between buying a postcard of a place you've
| never been and having a photo you took as a memento.
| nom wrote:
| i choose to believe it is done solely to annoy the flat
| earthers
| pierrec wrote:
| They are not shy about publishing LRO data. It looks like this
| (one for each LRO camera, narrow angle then wide angle):
|
| https://data.lroc.im-ldi.com/lroc/view_lroc/LRO-L-LROC-2-EDR...
|
| https://data.lroc.im-ldi.com/lroc/view_lroc/LRO-L-LROC-2-EDR...
|
| Feel free to assemble these into nice composites or 3D renders.
| m3kw9 wrote:
| This is the best shot, as it is shown with the perspective of a
| person inside the space ship. All the other ones are just high
| res versions of the Moon pics we've all seen before.
|
| https://www.nasa.gov/image-detail/amf-art002e012279/
| nirav72 wrote:
| That one pic with Solar eclipse is amazing. Especially with the
| visible stars in the background. it's rare to see a pic from a
| man missioned with stars being visible in the background.
| HALtheWise wrote:
| Tangentially related, but there's a bunch of extremely high-
| resolution panorama images from the Apollo landings available at
| this site, for anyone who enjoys this sort of thing.
| https://www.lpi.usra.edu/resources/apollopanoramas/
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