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Spacecraft captures Earth, moon en route to Mars
A camera built by an Arizona team aboard a NASA spacecraft captured images of Earth and the moon on its way to Mars. FOX 10's Steve Nielsen reports.
PHOENIX - A spacecraft is headed to Mars and is expected to arrive in less than a year.
An Arizona-based team ensured the spacecraft is equipped with a camera to capture never-before-seen pictures of the Red Planet. Before saying goodbye to Earth, the spacecraft captured several images from space.
What we know:
An incredible image shows the crescent shape of Earth on the left and the moon on the right. The camera that captured the image onboard the spacecraft was built at Northern Arizona University.
"We had to work with the team to get them to orient the spacecraft and roll it in just the right way so that our boresight was pointed right at Earth at the right time," said Chris Haberle of the Northern Arizona University Radiant Center for Remote Sensing.
More than 30 students worked over multiple semesters to make this happen on NASA's ESCAPADE mission. A rendering shows the position of Earth in the crescent shape the camera actually captured.
Members of the team said the camera has two ways to capture images.
"One of them is just like a cell phone camera type visible sensor. So it'll do a true color image in red, green, blue, and it's a relatively wide field of view. So it's 35 degrees. The objective there is when we get to Mars, we want to be able to image the entire disk of Mars once per orbit," Haberle said.
The other sensor produces an infrared shot to capture features such as heat signatures.
"You can kind of think of it just like your HVAC repair guy will come in and look for places where you're leaking heat out of your house," Haberle said.
Big picture view:
Simple and effective, the spacecraft now heads to Mars. There, a new round of students will be able to learn hands-on about what is possible.
"This was one of the most engaging classes I think any of us had ever experienced in terms of teaching, and being a part of … students are excited to do something like this because it's an opportunity few people have the opportunity to do," Haberle said.