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Timeline of first images of Earth from space

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This is a timeline of first images of Earth from space. The initial photographs and digital images of planet Earth taken from outer space were preceded by aerial photography and continue in the form of satellite imagery.

For the purpose of this list, a spaceflight is defined as any flight that crosses the Kármán line, the FAI-recognized edge of space, which is 100 kilometres (62 miles) above mean sea level (AMSL).

Images

Image Date Craft or mission Event
October 24, 1946 V-2 First image of Earth from outer space, taken by the V-2 No. 13 suborbital spaceflight.[1][2][3][4][5][6][7][8]
March 7, 1947 First panorama of Earth from outer space.[9]
October 5, 1954 Aerobee AJ10-24

RTV-N-10b

First color photomosaic of Earth from space, composed of 117 images taken from an altitude of 100 miles.[10][11]
[image needed] February–March 1959 Vanguard 2 First attempt of a scanner, in which a single photocell mounted at the focus of telescope would scan Earth due to the satellite movement; resulting images were poor.[12]
August 14, 1959 Explorer 6 First image of Earth from orbit, showing a sunlit area of the Central Pacific Ocean and its cloud cover.[13][14][15][16]
[image needed] 1959 Explorer 7 The first "coarse maps of the solar radiation reflected by the Earth and the infrared radiation emitted by the Earth", from a mission launched on October 13, 1959.[17]
1960 TIROS-1 First television image of Earth from space and first weather satellite picture.[18]
1960 CORONA "[F]irst space-based Earth observation system";[19] its first successful mission was Discoverer 14 on 19 August 1960 with the recovery of photographic film from an orbiting satellite.[19][20]
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August 6, 1961 Vostok 2 First image of Earth from space taken by a person, first color images and first movie of Earth from space, by cosmonaut Gherman Titov – the first photographer from space.[21][22]
Dmiddeclass2senegalafrica 1963 KH-7 Gambit First high-resolution (sub-meter spatial resolution) satellite photography (classified).[23]
1964 Quill First radar images of Earth from space, using a synthetic aperture radar (SAR).[24] This shows part of Richmond, Virginia.
March 18, 1965 Voskhod 2 First image and video of Earth with a human (Alexei Leonov) floating in space (the first ever EVA).[citation needed]
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First drawing of Earth from space and art made in space (by Leonov, the first artist in space).[25]
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May 30, 1966 Molniya 1-3 First full-disk pictures of the Earth, published in Review of Popular Astronomy July–August.[26][16]
August 23, 1966 Lunar Orbiter 1 First image of Earth from another astronomical object (the Moon) and first picture of both Earth and the Moon from space.[27][28][29][7][15]
December 11, 1966 ATS-1 First picture of both Earth and the Moon from the Earth's orbit.[30]
First full-disk pictures of the Earth from a geostationary orbit.[30]
[image needed] January 1967 First movie of Earth from space made without a human camera operator (contrast to Titov's 1961 movie)[30]
April 30, 1967 Surveyor 3 First image of Earth from another astronomical object's (the Moon's) surface.[31]
September 20, 1967 (released November 10th)[32] DODGE First full-disk black-and-white filtered[32] color picture of the Earth.[6]
November 10, 1967 ATS-3 First full-disk "true color"[33] picture of the Earth;[34] subsequently used on the cover of the first Whole Earth Catalog.[35][34]
December 21, 1968 Apollo 8 First full-disk image of Earth from space taken by a person, probably by astronaut William Anders.[36]
December 24, 1968 The first photograph of Earth taken by a human (Frank Borman) from another astronomical object (the Moon).[37]
The Earthrise image is the first color image of Earth from the Moon by a person (William Anders),[28][6][15], moments after Borman's black-and-white photograph.
July 21, 1969 Apollo 11 The much reproduced full frame image AS11-40-5903 of Buzz Aldrin, happens to be the first indirect image of Earth taken by a person from the surface of another astronomical object (from the Moon), having by accident in his visor a reflection of Earth.[38]
First direct image of Earth taken by a person from the surface of another astronomical object (from the Moon), (AS11-40-5923).[16][39]
November 24, 1969 Apollo 12 Black-and-white images and 16mm color film of a solar eclipse with the Earth, when the Apollo 12 spacecraft aligned its view of the Sun with the Earth.[40]
December 7, 1972 Apollo 17 First fully illuminated color image of the Earth by a person (AS17-148-22725).[41] Soon after, the second shot after this, having the same perspective, became cropped and processed the widely used Blue Marble picture (AS17-148-22727).[42][43]
[image needed] 1977 KH-11 First real-time satellite imagery.[44]
September 18, 1977 Voyager 1 First full-disk picture of both Earth and the Moon.[30]
February 14, 1990 The Pale Blue Dot is the first image of Earth from beyond all of the other Solar System planets. It is part of the first picture of the full extent of the planetary system, known as the Family Portrait.[15][45]
December 11, 1990 Galileo First movie of a full rotation of Earth.[46]
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August 11, 1999 Mir EO-27 (Perseus) First view of the shadow of the Moon projected onto Earth during a total solar eclipse (photograph taken by Jean-Pierre Haigneré).[40]
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October 13, 1999 IKONOS First commercial high-resolution (sub-meter) satellite photography (non-classified); it made the cover of the New York Times.[47]
May 8, 2003 13:00 UTC Mars Global Surveyor First image of Earth and the Moon from Mars (in orbit); notice South America is visible.[28][6]
March 11, 2004 Spirit Mars Exploration rover First image taken of Earth from the surface of Mars and any celestial body other than the Moon.
July 27, 2006 Cassini-Huygens The Pale Blue Orb is the first image of Earth from Saturn (and second image from the outer Solar System).[48]

See also

References

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  2. ^ "The First Image of Earth Taken From Space (It's Not What You Think)". August 6, 2012. Archived from the original on August 8, 2020.
  3. ^ "First photo of Earth from space was from deadly rocket". February 26, 2015. Archived from the original on November 8, 2020.
  4. ^ "70 years ago the first image of Earth was taken from space". October 26, 2016. Archived from the original on October 29, 2016.
  5. ^ "The First Photo of Earth From Space Was Taken 70 Years Ago Today". October 24, 2016. Archived from the original on October 27, 2016.
  6. ^ a b c d "Viewing The Earth From Space Celebrates 70 Years". August 22, 2016. Archived from the original on August 23, 2016.
  7. ^ a b "Space Photos Before NASA: The Oldest Images Of Earth". October 28, 2017. Archived from the original on October 28, 2017.
  8. ^ "The first photograph of Earth taken from space". October 24, 2017. Archived from the original on June 17, 2018.
  9. ^ "First Pictures of Earth From 100 Miles in Space, 1947". March 6, 2009. Archived from the original on March 7, 2009.
  10. ^ "Photo-Mosaic, Aerobee | National Air and Space Museum". airandspace.si.edu. Retrieved January 7, 2023.
  11. ^ "541005-N-NO204-0001". www.nrl.navy.mil. Retrieved January 7, 2023.
  12. ^ "Vanguard II Turns 60". April 23, 2019. Archived from the original on March 18, 2021. Retrieved March 27, 2021.
  13. ^ "Explorer 6: 60 years since first Earth photo from space". August 7, 2019. Archived from the original on August 8, 2019.
  14. ^ "60 years ago first satellite image of Earth". September 7, 2019. Archived from the original on September 7, 2020.
  15. ^ a b c d "60 Years Ago We Saw Earth From Space for the First Time — Here's How We See It Now". August 22, 2019. Archived from the original on August 23, 2019.
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  18. ^ Anderson, George D. (April 1, 2010). "The first weather satellite picture". Weather. 65 (4): 87. Bibcode:2010Wthr...65...87A. doi:10.1002/wea.550. ISSN 1477-8696.
  19. ^ a b "2005 Draper Prize – Corona Historic Images". NAE Website.
  20. ^ "Discoverer 14 – NSSDC ID: 1960-010A". NASA.
  21. ^ Reichhardt, Tony (August 5, 2011). "The First Photographer in Space". Air & Space Magazine. Retrieved May 19, 2021.
  22. ^ "Vostok-2 mission". RussianSpaceWeb.com. August 6, 1961. Retrieved October 21, 2021.
  23. ^ "USGS EROS Archive – Declassified Data – Declassified Satellite Imagery – 2". Archived from the original on February 29, 2020. Retrieved March 18, 2021.
  24. ^ Robert L. Butterworth "Quill: The First Imaging Radar Satellite"
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  26. ^ Joel Achenbach (January 3, 2012). "Spaceship Earth: The first photos". Retrieved June 16, 2020.
  27. ^ Stein, Ben P. (August 23, 2011). "45 Years Ago: How the 1st Photo of Earth From the Moon Happened". Space.com. Retrieved October 7, 2020.
  28. ^ a b c "Milestones in Space Photography". November 11, 2010. Archived from the original on April 1, 2020.
  29. ^ "Fifty Years Ago, This Photo Captured the First View of Earth From the Moon". August 23, 2016. Archived from the original on August 25, 2016.
  30. ^ a b c d "The 50th Anniversary of ATS-1". NOAA National Environmental Satellite, Data, and Information Service (NESDIS). December 6, 2016. Retrieved October 5, 2020.
  31. ^ "First image of Earth from the surface of the Moon: Surveyor 3". The Planetary Society. Archived from the original on September 24, 2020.
  32. ^ a b "The First Color Images of the Earth from Space". Geography Realm. March 13, 2019. Retrieved February 2, 2022.
  33. ^ Miller, Steven D.; Schmit, Timothy L.; Seaman, Curtis J.; Lindsey, Daniel T.; Gunshor, Mathew M.; Kohrs, Richard A.; Sumida, Yasuhiko; Hillger, Donald (October 1, 2016). "A Sight for Sore Eyes: The Return of True Color to Geostationary Satellites". Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society. 97 (10). American Meteorological Society: 1803–1816. doi:10.1175/bams-d-15-00154.1. ISSN 0003-0007.
  34. ^ a b @SciHistoryOrg (April 24, 2020). "Science History Institute on Twitter" (Tweet) – via Twitter.
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  39. ^ "March to the Moon". March to the Moon. Retrieved February 5, 2022.
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  48. ^ "This day in 2013: The Day the Earth Smiled". EarthSky. July 19, 2020. Retrieved May 22, 2021.