New Year's Eve Where In The Universe Challenge
Written by Nancy Atkinson
We'll squeeze in one more WITU Challenge for 2008! The goal of this challenge is to test your skills and knowledge of the cosmos. Guess where in the Universe this image is from, and give yourself extra points if you can guess which spacecraft is responsible for the image. Post your guess in the comment section (no links to hints please!) and check back tomorrow for the answer. Good luck, and Happy New Year!
UPDATE (1/1/09): The answer has now been posted below. If you haven't made your guess yet, no peeking before you do!!
This beautiful image shows the setting sun glinting off the Amazon River and numerous lakes in its floodplain, taken by an astronaut on board the ISS in August 19, 2008. About 150 kilometers of the sinuous Amazon is shown here; the area is about 1,000 kilometers inland from the Atlantic Ocean. A member of Expedtion 17 took the image with a Nikon D2Xs digital camera fitted with a 400 mm lens. This image is part of the ISS Crew Earth Observations experiment. The original image can be seen at NASA's Earth Observatory website.
I really will provide the answer and a link to the original picture when it is time. There's really no need to provide links to the answer in the comments.
Happy New Year, and check back again next week for another Where In The Universe Challenge.
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December 31st, 2008 at 1:07 pm
Planet Earth, taken by the I.S.S. I am guessing the Amazon River Delta.
December 31st, 2008 at 1:12 pm
Earth (Nile Delta?) The ISS.
December 31st, 2008 at 1:43 pm
In a brief history of time, this image appears somewhere in the vast cosmos as a mere subatomic speck.
December 31st, 2008 at 1:54 pm
That's the Amazon River in the setting sun, photographed by the crew of the International Space Station.
Happy New Year!
December 31st, 2008 at 2:01 pm
I think it's Titan, Saturn's largest moon. It looks like the the methane/ethane oceans on the surface.
December 31st, 2008 at 2:03 pm
I don't know where it is but it sure is a beautiful sight. Thanks for sharing it.
December 31st, 2008 at 2:14 pm
I forgot to say the spacecraft. Cassini.
December 31st, 2008 at 3:01 pm
Well, the image looks like a 'lava flow'-
It doesn't look like any of the photos I've seen
of Mars. It doesn't look like Venus. The moons I've seen, though with active plumes,
and lava flows- dried or not, don't seem to fit the lava flows in this picture.. Though,
I think I've seen the picture before, but I don't remember when or where..
Bewildered..
And with that said, I'll guess -Saturns' Moon
Titan. Since the picture of Saturn is next..
December 31st, 2008 at 3:17 pm
Must be earth, where else can you get this stunning combination of surface liquid, atmospheric clouds and sunset golden color…
And such a picturesque photo is most likely taken from the ISS
December 31st, 2008 at 5:43 pm
Nah nah nah, Nancy: this is the first challenge of 2009, not the last one of 2008.
For me, at least… It's almost 1 in the morning around here.
This is obviously our beautiful little blue planet, even if this photo has very little blue in it. Probably something shot from the vantage point of the ISS, or maybe the Shuttle (but I'm betting the ISS), and the morphology of the terrain leads me into guessing a sub-polar river, maybe in Alaska or Canada.
Happy 2009, people.
December 31st, 2008 at 6:09 pm
I am sure that the image must be of the amazon river.
But I also remember seeing another similar image of russia taken by a expedition 13 crew member.
So, either one of the two is correct.
December 31st, 2008 at 8:52 pm
ISS image of the Amazon Delta.
And Tim,
Cassini is not capable of producing surface images of Titan from above in this kind of colour or with this kind of detail.
December 31st, 2008 at 9:23 pm
First guess is the Amazon River Delta, but, I can't find the picture anywhere.
December 31st, 2008 at 11:32 pm
Earth. Taken by ISS.
December 31st, 2008 at 11:47 pm
Earth rivers at sunset.
January 1st, 2009 at 1:07 am
Those look like meandering rivers, with plenty of bends and turns. Those are typical of a place flush with verdant life, such as a rainforest on Earth, not of an abiotic world. So I'll guess either the Amazon Basin or the Congo.
January 1st, 2009 at 2:50 am
Best guess is that it's earth. ISS is as good a tripod as any. HAPPY NEW YEAR!
January 1st, 2009 at 3:14 am
Hi! My initial guess was Titan ..But after reading the comments above i am not so sure…..
Wish u all a very Happy New Year!!!
January 1st, 2009 at 4:03 am
It's definitely a river network on Earth and almost certainly from the ISS or a Shuttle mission.
Kind of looks like south Louisiana or the Three Rivers area near the Louisiana/Mississippi border where the Red River joins the Mississippi River and Atchafalaya Basin.
Working offshore in the GOM, I fly over similar areas every couple of weeks (though, at a much lower altitude) and the sun reflects just like this in the mornings and evenings.
January 1st, 2009 at 7:26 am
Earth river(s). A tropical, semi-tropical delta. Or perhaps a temperate river during a summer month. It could be thi inland waterway of the US or perhaps the Mississippi (but I see no sign of a major US city). Just for variety I'll guess the Ganges delta.
Happy New Year Nancy! My absolute favorite science writer. Best wishes for the coming year.
January 1st, 2009 at 8:44 am
From a geologic point of view, this is a tributary system. Some substance is acting in a fluid-like manner, and flows from the upper left to the lower right. The most likely fluid is water. The terrain it is passing through is very flat, hence the wide "S's". The inputting tributaries are short and straight, so suggest they come from a higher level, hills or something. No central 'ocean' is seen Sharp cutoffs of the tributaries in the upper left, and blurring in the bottom left suggest clouds. The photos must be of Earth, as the only other planet-with-flowing-fluid photos are from Cassini of Titan, but I've never seen them so clear and colorful. Since I cannot recall a river delta this short, and there's no central ocean, I'm going to say the Denali glacier from the ISS, just to be different.
January 1st, 2009 at 10:31 am
It's a cleaned up (finally!) view of Titan. The color gives it away.
Or it could just be wishful thinking on my part….. I was very disappointed with the photos from Titan.
January 1st, 2009 at 11:33 am
It is an astronaut picture of the Amazon River and its floodplains, taken August 19, 2008. This photo shows the river about 1000 km from the mouth into the Atlantic.
January 1st, 2009 at 11:35 am
Oh, by the way, the spacecraft is the ISS. See
http://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/IOTD/view.php?id=9072
for more details.
January 1st, 2009 at 1:44 pm
somewhere on earth
January 1st, 2009 at 1:56 pm
Must be Earth, maybe through ISS?
January 1st, 2009 at 2:13 pm
It defenatly is earth because we cant get close up shots like that anywhere else
January 1st, 2009 at 4:06 pm
I'll agree with most of the other posters, it's Earth– but it looks to me like it could be a glacier photographed as the sun was setting, where the light is hitting just the few spots that are a little more elevated.
January 1st, 2009 at 5:53 pm
Tom, it's official now: you're an asshole.
January 1st, 2009 at 9:49 pm
It's what's left of some Tennessee rivers after the coal sludge dam broke.
January 2nd, 2009 at 3:30 pm
its taken by the iss and its on earth
January 3rd, 2009 at 3:53 am
Arctic Canada from 10km up?
January 3rd, 2009 at 3:55 am
Way off
January 3rd, 2009 at 8:41 am
Good one! I guessed the Ganges Delta – a dead miss. The Amazon in the wet season – shoulda known! There's plenty of hints if ya look carefully. Love these things!
January 5th, 2009 at 5:28 am
Tom is not an ass hole… He is a WHOLE ASS
January 5th, 2009 at 12:55 pm
River delta? maybe Amazon from the ISS