The Workermonkey

Saturday, November 26, 2005

Let there be darkness, and there was 

# posted by Damon @ 11/26/2005 12:24:00 PM

Nifty picture eh? From a NASA sat, it is interesting to see population centers. Really look for the US/Canadian border the see how close most of them live. The US looks more evenly populated than I thought it was. Or maybe they just have lots of streetlights on empty streets in the midwest and west. Look at India's even light coverage, and China's lack of light. Anyway, cool pic I came across on another day I came home at 3:30 and thought it was dinner time because it was dark. The sun sets at 3. Then by now, 6:30, I feel like it's late, because it's already been dark for so long. The sun rises at 8, and there is one more hour to lose before the minimum of 6 hours of daylight just before Yule.

4 comments

Wow India is really even. China still has little development in thier rural areas - only along their coast. Tokyo looks pretty banging. I'm wondering if that's the trans-siberian railway across russia. I thought it was higher...
And what are those bright ones off Mozambique? A military base?

By  DJ Booze Piñata, at Saturday, November 26, 2005 12:53:00 PM  

Yeah those are the same kind of things I was thinking and that's why it is interesting. And of course, "How did they get the whole planet in the dark at once?" How did they get a sat to stay opposite the sun, not roating with earth, but following earth's orbit. Those ones that stay over one spot on the surface are easier to imagine.

By  Damon, at Saturday, November 26, 2005 2:04:00 PM  

nice pic.

as for how they did it. i guarantee that its a composite pic stitched together from thousands of individual shots like all nasa pictures.

can you imagine how dark it would be without light pollution. When i go upstate to NY i'm amazed how much more dark it gets and thats still pretty bright according to this pic.

By  ron, at Saturday, November 26, 2005 3:02:00 PM  

Yes of course it's composite, since the camera taking a photo of New Zealand is nearly facing the camera taking a shot of New England. I am just wondering about the satellite orbit, but I'm thinking how they could do it in a day, but it probably took much longer so many more orbits could be used. I like the terms light pollution and light trespassing used in some Vermont government paper I was reading, and there too, on top of that mountain in Newfane, it gets very dark and there seems to be many times more stars than can be seen from CT. Oh and forget it in Sthlm, but damn me for skipping a party out in the archipelago, as all those drunken fools got to see a brilliant display of the Northern Lights taking up that whole third of the sky at 2am.

By  Damon, at Sunday, November 27, 2005 2:43:00 AM  

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