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Astronomy Picture Of the Day (APOD)
The Sea of Tranquillity: 5 Seconds To Impact
30.07.1999
On February 20th, 1965, the Ranger 8 spacecraft crashed into the Moon. Rapidly transmitting a series of pictures to ground controllers, its camera recorded this one at an altitude of about 11 kilometers, 5 seconds before impacting the lunar surface. Two kilometers across, with 4 meter
Hydrogen Blob N88A in the Small Magellanic Cloud
29.07.1999
The bright blob of hydrogen gas cataloged as N88A is seen at the right. It measures a mere 3 light years across. Emerging from the cool, dusty interstellar medium in a nearby irregular galaxy known as the Small Magellanic Cloud, N88A hides hot young stars at its core.
Asia at Night
28.07.1999
This is what Asia looks like at night! Can you find your favorite Asian city? Although not all of Asia is shown, city lights might make this task possible. The above picture is actually a composite of over 200 images made by satellites orbiting the Earth.
Chandra X Ray Telescope
27.07.1999
Wrapped in protective blankets and mounted atop an Inertial Upper Stage (IUS) rocket, the Chandra X-ray Telescope is seen in this wide-angle view before launch snuggled into the space shuttle Columbia's payload bay.
Noctilucent Clouds
26.07.1999
Sometimes it's night on the ground but day in the air. As the Earth rotates to eclipse the Sun, sunset rises up from the ground. Therefore, at sunset on the ground, sunlight still shines on clouds above.
The Cygnus Loop
25.07.1999
The shockwave from a 20,000 year-old supernova in the constellation of Cygnus supernova explosion is still expanding into interstellar space. The collision of this fast moving wall of gas with a stationary cloud...
Infrared Saturn
24.07.1999
This delightfully detailed false color image of Saturn was earmarked to celebrate the 8th anniversary of the orbiting Hubble Space Telescope. The picture is a combination of three images taken in January 1998 and shows the lovely ringed planet in reflected infrared light.
A Martian Valley
23.07.1999
This tantalizing close-up detail of a network of martian valleys was recorded from orbit this April by Mars Global Surveyor's camera. Water may once have flowed here but now sand dunes stripe the windswept valley floor.
Cosmic Collisions in a Galaxy Cluster
22.07.1999
Hundreds of galaxies appear as faint smudges of light in this Hubble Space Telescope picture of galaxy cluster MS1054-03. Eight billion light-years away, the cluster is among the most distant known clusters of galaxies and is now reported to contain the largest number of colliding galaxies ever found in a cluster.
Galactic Supernova Remnant IC 443
21.07.1999
About 8000 years ago, a star in our Galaxy exploded. Ancient humans might have noticed the supernova as a temporary star, but modern humans can see the expanding shell of gas even today.
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