Awe-inspiring footage of ‘Earthrise’ captured by a Japanese space orbiter has reappeared on the internet.
The dawn of space exploration has introduced us to some of the universe’s most incredible wonders from millions of miles away.
Whether it’s a chilling image of an astronaut adrift in space or an asteroid silhouetted against the immense darkness, these visuals are truly stunning.
Recently, footage from Japan’s Kaguya moon mission has gained widespread attention on social media.
The video, taken by the space orbiter, shows Earth emerging from behind the moon — an unusual and breathtaking sight that’s been aptly named ‘Earthrise’.
Kaguya was the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency’s (JAXA) second mission to explore the moon from orbit, which launched on September 14, 2007.
On November 7, the orbiter captured the magnificent ‘Earthrise’ footage — the first since the Apollo missions nearly 39 years earlier.
Sharing the phenomenon on Reddit’s R/SpacePorn community, a user posted a GIF of the event, commenting: “Earth rise is beautiful.”
The post has garnered more than nine thousand upvotes and attracted hundreds of comments.
Predictably, responses varied from awe-filled to humorous.
“I don’t mean to brag but… I live over there,” one user joked, while another simply stated: “Incredible.”
“Look again at that dot. That’s here. That’s home. That’s us,” a third user commented, quoting Carl Sagan’s Pale Blue Dot.
Another user humorously suggested: “Post this in the flat Earth sub.”
The first human-captured Earthrise happened on December 24, 1968, when NASA astronaut Bill Anders took what became an iconic photograph.
“Taken aboard Apollo 8 by Bill Anders, this iconic picture shows Earth peeking out from beyond the lunar surface as the first crewed spacecraft circumnavigated the Moon, with astronauts Anders, Frank Borman, and Jim Lovell aboard,” according to NASA.
Nature photographer Galen Rowell described the photo as ‘the most influential environmental photograph ever taken’.
The view of Earth took the Apollo 8 crew by complete surprise.
As historian Robert Poole detailed, the unexpected nature of the sight made it feel revelatory — not only for the astronauts in space but also for those watching on Earth.
“We came all this way to explore the Moon, Apollo 8 and the most important thing is that we discovered the Earth,” Bill Anders said about the photo.