Picture the Earth and Moon from Six Million Miles Away!

 Image credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/SwRI 

The Juno spacecraft is headed off to Jupiter and it took a moment to swing its camera back toward the Earth to capture the interesting image of the Earth and its moon.  This image offers and interesting perspective of our planet. one that is rarely seen except on the occasional science fiction movie or Star Trek episode.

But here we have just another case where NASA has brought science fiction to life!

This image was taken when Juno was more than 6 million miles away from the Earth back on August 26, 2011 after the Juno mission has spent nearly three weeks in space.  The Juno spacecraft is expected to reach Jupiter in 2016.  The Juno mission will study Jupiter's atmosphere, search for water, and map the planet's immense magnetic field.

Juno will spend about a year orbiting Jupiter and is expected to de-orbit and crash into the  planet in October 2017.

Source:
http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/juno/news/juno20110830.html