Moonrise Through Mauna Keas Shadow
3.12.2003

How can the Moon rise through a mountain? It cannot -- what was photographed here is a moonrise through the shadow of a large volcano. The volcano is Mauna Kea, Hawai'i, USA, a frequent spot for spectacular photographs since it is arguably the premier observing location on planet Earth.

Orions Horsehead Nebula
21.03.2005

The Horsehead Nebula is one of the most famous nebulae on the sky. It is visible as the dark indentation to the red emission nebula seen above and to the right of center in the above photograph. The bright star on the left is located in the belt of the familiar constellation of Orion.

Blue Marble 2000
20.04.2000

This newly released digital portrait of our planet is reminiscent of the Apollo-era pictures of the "big blue marble" Earth from space. To create it, researchers at Goddard Space Flight Center's Laboratory...

Golden Gate Sunset: Green Flash
2.12.2015

The setting is San Francisco Bay, the time is sunset, and the bridge is the Golden Gate. What you are about to see is an unexpected double sunset ending with a rare green flash.

APOD: 2023 October 22 Б Ghost Aurora over Canada
22.10.2023

What does this aurora look like to you? While braving the cold to watch the skies above northern Canada early one morning in 2013, a most unusual aurora appeared. The aurora definitely appeared to be shaped like something, but what?

APOD: 2023 December 5 Б Energetic Particle Strikes the Earth
5.12.2023

It was one of the most energetic particles ever known to strike the Earth -- but where did it come from? Dubbed Amaterasu after the Shinto sun goddess, this particle, as do all cosmic rays...

Flying over the Earth at Night II
12.03.2018

What would it be like to orbit the Earth? The International Space Station (ISS) does this every 90 minutes, and sometimes the astronauts on board take image sequences that are made into videos. The featured time-lapse video shows many visual spectacles of the dark Earth below.

Aurora and Fireball Over Norway
5.10.2012

What's happening behind that mountain? A convergence of variable sky spectacles. One night in mid-September near TromsЬ, Norway, high red aurora could be seen shimmering through lower green aurora in a way that created a striking and somewhat unusual violet glow.

The Horsehead Nebula
6.10.2019

The Horsehead Nebula is one of the most famous nebulae on the sky. It is visible as the dark indentation to the red emission nebula in the center of the above photograph. The horse-head feature is dark because it is really an opaque dust cloud that lies in front of the bright red emission nebula.

A Sonic Boom
19.08.2007

Is this what a sonic boom looks like? When an airplane travels at a speed faster than sound, density waves of sound emitted by the plane cannot precede the plane, and so accumulate in a cone behind the plane.