Earth from Space Photos

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Here are some cool earth from space photos. You can make any of these images into your computer desktop wallpaper. Just click on an image to enlarge it, and then choose “Set as Desktop Background”.

Oblique shot of Earth

This image showing the earth’s curvature and the very nice clouds was taken from a space shuttle during the EarthKAM program in September 4, 1997. The space shuttle was directly above the northwestern part of the African continent when this image was captured.

The Earth-Moon System

This is a nice view of the planet earth and the moon in one frame as seen from the Galileo spacecraft 6.2 million kilometers away.

A View to Earth

Here’s a nice view of the planet earth and the space shuttle Endeavour docked with the International Space Station. The space shuttle Endeavour, launched in 1992 was the replacement of the space shuttle Challenger.

The Blue Marble from Apollo 17

This is a spectacular full view of our planet earth. It was taken by the Apollo 17 during their journey to the moon in December 7, 1972. The south polar ice cap of Antarctica can be clearly seen in the image. This region constitutes 70% of the world’s freshwater. This photo of the earth was the first to feature the south polar ice cap.

Backdropped by a Colorful Earth

This picture shows two astronauts, Robert L. Curbeam, Jr. (left) and Christer Fuglesang while conducting an extravehicular activity outside the International Space Station as part of the STS-116 mission. On the background is the Cook Strait in New Zealand and the Pacific Ocean.

We have written many articles about the earth for Universe Today. Here’s an article about the surface area of the earth, and here’s an article about how long it takes sunshine to reach the earth.

If you’d like more Earth from space photos, check out Visible Earth Homepage. And here’s a link to NASA’s Earth Observatory.

We’ve also recorded an episode of Astronomy Cast all about planet Earth. Listen here, Episode 51: Earth.