What Does the Moon Look Like from Space?

By Nancy Atkinson - August 09, 2011 11:36 PM UTC | Planetary Science

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Ah, the Moon! Earth's constant companion and the subject of songs, poetry, and many an astrophoto here on Universe Today. But we always gaze upon the Moon under the cover of Earth's atmosphere. Does it look any different from up above the world so high? Astronauts from the ISS have taken plenty of pictures of the Moon, and here are a couple recent and notable lunar images. The one above is of a crescent Moon taken in March of this year (2011) -- notice the bright crescent sliver present even while the entire moon is visible. Here, the Moon looks teeny tiny. Below is another view of a bigger, but still crescent Moon as seen from the ISS.

[caption id="attachment_88067" align="aligncenter" width="580" caption="The Moon as seen by astronaut Ron Garan on the ISS on July 31, 2011. Credit: NASA/ Ron Garan"]

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Expedition 28 astronaut Ron Garan took this image just a few days ago on July 31, 2011 from the International Space Station. This is such a stunning image, it was featured on

NASA's Image of the Day Gallery.

Garan noted the view saying, "We had simultaneous sunsets and moonsets." For anyone in orbit, this extraordinary event is a daily occurrence. Since the station orbits the Earth every 90 minutes, each day the crew experiences such a view about 16 times a day.

See more from Ron Garan on his

Twitpic page.

Nancy Atkinson

Nancy Atkinson

Nancy Atkinson is a space journalist and author with a passion for telling the stories of people involved in space exploration and astronomy. She is currently retired from daily writing, but worked at Universe Today for 20 years as a writer and editor. She also contributed articles to The Planetary Society, Ad Astra (National Space Society), New Scientist and many other online outlets.

Her 2019 book, "Eight Years to the Moon: The History of the Apollo Missions,” shares the untold stories of engineers and scientists who worked behind the scenes to make the Apollo program so successful, despite the daunting odds against it. Her first book “Incredible Stories From Space: A Behind-the-Scenes Look at the Missions Changing Our View of the Cosmos” (2016) tells the stories of 37 scientists and engineers that work on several current NASA robotic missions to explore the solar system and beyond.

Nancy is also a NASA/JPL Solar System Ambassador, and through this program, she has the opportunity to share her passion of space and astronomy with children and adults through presentations and programs. Nancy's personal website is nancyatkinson.com