NASA's Deep Space Climate Observatory (DSCOVR) is allowing us to see beautiful views of our own planet as well as epic views of the moon, however the primary mission of the satellite is to monitor solar wind.
On Wednesday, NASA released an animation showing the dark side of our moon, as it transits the Earth. This is a rare view of a site that the general public cannot usually see. A series of images obtained from DSCOVR's Earth Polychromatic Imaging Camera (EPIC) camera and telescope were used to create the dark side of the moon animation. The images were taken on July 16, between 3:50 p.m. and 8:45 p.m. ET. They show the moon moving near the North American coast, over the Pacific Ocean.
DSCOVR is orbiting Earth at a distance of one million miles away from the surface of our planet. The satellite is aimed to serve as an early warning system against harmful solar activity heading our way.
According to NASA, in addition to capturing great images of our own space rock, the EPIC camera aboard the craft will not only capture great images of the Earth and the Moon, but it will also be used in various science applications to measure cloud height and phase, aerosol amounts, ozone amounts, hotspot land properties, vegetation properties, and UV radiation estimates at Earth's surface.
DSCOVR's high-resolution camera takes every day a full-color image of our planet. Once every few months, the camera has the chance to catch the moon when it is directly between the craft and the Earth. Other impressive animation videos based on these images were released earlier this year.
Thanks to DSCOVR's camera, the dark side of the moon just becomes not-so-dark side. The detailed animated clip is showing what the Moon looks like on its side that is never visible from Earth.
In NASA's video, the general public can see the dark side going through a cycle of phases and a different terrain, with just a few big dark basalt plains known as "maria" and many craters of various sizes covering the entire area.
The first images of the moon's dark side were transmitted in the year 1959, by the Soviet Luna 3 probe. Only fifty years later, the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO) started to relay hundreds of terabytes of data since the year 2009.
Scientists were able to create detailed maps of the moon's surface, thanks to these images. However, the animations created by NASA's Scientific Visualization Studio allow the general public to see a completely different side of our nearest planetary neighbor.
