Nasa has shared the first high-resolution images of the Earth taken by the Artemis II crew as they head on their trip around the Moon.
The mission's commander, Reid Wiseman, took the spectacular images, Nasa says, after the crew completed a final engine burn that set them on a trajectory towards our closest celestial neighbor.
The first image, called Hello, World, shows the vast expanse of blue that is the Atlantic Ocean, framed by a thin glow of the atmosphere as the Earth eclipses the Sun, along with green auroras at either pole.
The Earth appears to us as upside down, with the western Sahara and Iberian peninsula visible to the left and the eastern portion of South America to the right.
Nasa identified the bright planet to the bottom right as Venus.
These images were taken after the crew successfully completed a trans-lunar injection burn in the early hours of Friday, taking the Orion spacecraft out of Earth orbit as the four astronauts aim to travel more than 200,000 miles to the Moon.
Artemis II is now on a looping path that will carry the crew around the far side of the Moon and back again, marking the first time humans have traveled outside of the Earth's orbit since 1972. The crew is expected to pass around the far side of the Moon on April 6 and return to Earth on April 10.
After the burn was completed, the crew were glued to the windows taking pictures, mission specialist Jeremy Hansen told mission control in Houston. We are getting a beautiful view of the dark side of the Earth, lit by the Moon, he said. Wiseman later inquired about how to clean the windows, as the astronauts' enthusiasm to see into space had left them dirty. The commander had initially found it hard to take pictures of our planet from the spacecraft, noting that the distant perspective was akin to trying to photograph the Moon from one's backyard.
Another view captured by Wiseman shows the Earth divided by night and day—this frontier between light and darkness is known as the terminator.
