Comments on: New Year's Eve Where In The Universe Challenge

By: r winrich

r winrich — Mon, 05 Jan 2009 19:55:56 +0000

River delta? maybe Amazon from the ISS

By: Mr. Obvious

Mr. Obvious — Mon, 05 Jan 2009 12:28:06 +0000

Tom is not an ass hole… He is a WHOLE ASS

By: neoguru

neoguru — Sat, 03 Jan 2009 15:41:34 +0000

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!

By: Spoodle58

Spoodle58 — Sat, 03 Jan 2009 10:55:36 +0000

Way off

By: Spoodle58

Spoodle58 — Sat, 03 Jan 2009 10:53:38 +0000

Arctic Canada from 10km up?

By: bob

bob — Fri, 02 Jan 2009 22:30:52 +0000

its taken by the iss and its on earth

By: btw

btw — Fri, 02 Jan 2009 04:49:23 +0000

It's what's left of some Tennessee rivers after the coal sludge dam broke.

By: Jorge

Jorge — Fri, 02 Jan 2009 00:53:01 +0000

Tom, it's official now: you're an asshole.

By: Dori

Dori — Thu, 01 Jan 2009 23:06:47 +0000

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.

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Thu, 01 Jan 2009 21:13:54 +0000

It defenatly is earth because we cant get close up shots like that anywhere else

By: IBY

IBY — Thu, 01 Jan 2009 20:56:11 +0000

Must be Earth, maybe through ISS?

By: elfofgod

elfofgod — Thu, 01 Jan 2009 20:44:08 +0000

somewhere on earth

By: Tom

Tom — Thu, 01 Jan 2009 18:35:18 +0000

Oh, by the way, the spacecraft is the ISS. See
http://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/IOTD/view.php?id=9072
for more details.

By: Tom

Tom — Thu, 01 Jan 2009 18:33:34 +0000

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.

By: gudenboink

gudenboink — Thu, 01 Jan 2009 17:31:05 +0000

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.

By: craig

craig — Thu, 01 Jan 2009 15:44:25 +0000

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.

By: neoguru

neoguru — Thu, 01 Jan 2009 14:26:15 +0000

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.

By: Steven G. Riggs

Steven G. Riggs — Thu, 01 Jan 2009 11:03:59 +0000

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.

By: Vino

Vino — Thu, 01 Jan 2009 10:14:54 +0000

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!!!

By: Harry Mays

Harry Mays — Thu, 01 Jan 2009 09:50:32 +0000

Best guess is that it's earth. ISS is as good a tripod as any. HAPPY NEW YEAR!

By: Yael Dragwyla

Yael Dragwyla — Thu, 01 Jan 2009 08:07:06 +0000

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.

By: ringman

ringman — Thu, 01 Jan 2009 06:47:38 +0000

Earth rivers at sunset.

By: RL

RL — Thu, 01 Jan 2009 06:32:18 +0000

Earth. Taken by ISS.

By: MAUDYFISH

MAUDYFISH — Thu, 01 Jan 2009 04:23:45 +0000

First guess is the Amazon River Delta, but, I can't find the picture anywhere.

By: Steve

Steve — Thu, 01 Jan 2009 03:52:17 +0000

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.