Black marble view of earth

'Black marble' views of Earth at night

Twinkling city lights, raging wildfires and colorful auroras are lit up in new dazzling nighttime views of the Earth. The new images released Dec. 5 are courtesy of a newly launched NASA-NOAA satellite that's equipped with a sensor to observe the planet at night.

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Gallery View:'Black marble' views of Earth at night

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1. Wed, Dec 5, 2012

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This new global view and animation of Earth’s city lights is a composite assembled from data acquired by the Suomi National Polar-orbiting Partnership (Suomi NPP) satellite. The data was acquired over nine days in April 2012 and thirteen days in October 2012. It took satellite 312 orbits and 2.5 terabytes of data to get a clear shot of every parcel of Earth’s land surface and islands. This new data was then mapped over existing Blue Marble ... more 

This new global view and animation of Earth’s city lights is a composite assembled from data acquired by the Suomi National Polar-orbiting Partnership (Suomi NPP) satellite. The data was acquired over nine days in April 2012 and thirteen days in October 2012. It took satellite 312 orbits and 2.5 terabytes of data to get a clear shot of every parcel of Earth’s land surface and islands. This new data was then mapped over existing Blue Marble imagery of Earth to provide a realistic view of the planet. (NASA)