NASA’s lunar orbiter has captured pictures of a surfboard-shaped object zooming previous the moon.
The shut encounter wasn’t a UFO or an alien megastructure. Somewhat, NASA’s Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO) noticed South Korea’s lunar orbiter Danuri zipping by as the 2 spacecraft circled the moon, NASA officers mentioned in a assertion.
As a result of the 2 spacecraft have been “touring in almost parallel orbits,” the LRO operations group at NASA’s Goddard House Flight Middle in Maryland took the chance to snap pictures of the occasion, which unfolded between March 5 and 6.
LRO’s digital camera has a really brief publicity time of about 0.338 milliseconds, making the occasion tough to seize. Nevertheless, it nonetheless managed to get pictures of Danuri, the primary Korean spacecraft to enter lunar orbit, which it achieved in December 2022.
Nevertheless, due to the velocity distinction between the 2 spacecraft — roughly 7,200 mph (11,500 km/h) — the ensuing picture makes Danuri seem like “smeared to 10 instances its measurement.” This stretching impact causes it to resemble a flat surfboard.
Associated: See a SpaceX rocket photobomb the moon in unbelievable award-winning shot
In actuality, Danuri seems nothing like a surfboard; it is a box-shaped spacecraft with two photo voltaic panels connected to every aspect.
Paul Byrne, an affiliate professor of planetary science at Washington College in St. Louis, shared some of the images on X (previously Twitter).
“To be clear, the Danuri orbiter will not be a weirdly skinny load of pixels — it is a pretty normal-looking orbiter,” Byrne posted. “However the terrific speeds concerned imply that it is smeared on the LRO’s digital camera detector.”
It did not take lengthy for folks to touch upon how the orbiter seemed eerily acquainted to Silver Surfer, a fictional humanoid alien within the Marvel Universe, based on NDTV, an India-based information outlet.
