While you might assume it’s easy to differentiate Earth from Mars, a European Space Agency astronaut, Thomas Pesquet, lately revealed he thought he was orbiting Mars even though it was once Earth.
“I thought I was orbiting Mars when I noticed this view! No cloud in sight and the red and ochre colors stretching to the horizon. This is how I think about the Perseverance rover would have considered Mars on its approach to landing,” states Pesquet in a caption for an photograph shared by him on his official Instagram account.
The photo was captured by Pesquet aboard the International Space Station. Ever since its posting, the photo has received over 188,000 likes and 1,100 comments. And with the brilliant red and orange color visible on the planet, Earth indeed resembles the red planet, at first glance. However, you can additionally see the striking blue colour in the image, shortly revealing that it’s actually Earth. Check it out:
In the caption, Pesquet also gave a shout-out to the NASA groups that flew a helicopter on Mars and the French teams that recorded the flight with audio. “Mars exploration is difficult however we are making enormous progress. China landed its Zhurong rover on Mars too, becoming only the second nation to do so successfully. ESA’s ExoMars TGO mission is orbiting Mars and the ExoMars rover is set for launch next year,” stated Pesuqet. “Scientists believe Mars used to be once a very different planet and its environment changed over billions of years, learning greater about its history can help us protect our future on our amazing home planet”.
Pesquet additionally recently shared a breathtaking photograph of a huge Upsala glacier melting away on his official Instagram page. The photograph was once captured by the French astronaut from the International Space Station (ISS). Pesquet regularly shares new images of our Earth on his official Instagram account “thom_astro”