The European Space Agency (ESA) is Europe’s gateway to space. Its mission is to shape the development of Europe’s space capability and ensure that investment in space continues to deliver benefits to the citizens of Europe and the world.
Find out more about space activities in our 23 Member States, and understand how ESA works together with their national agencies, institutions and organisations.
Exploring our Solar System and unlocking the secrets of the Universe
Go to topicProtecting life and infrastructure on Earth and in orbit
Go to topicUsing space to benefit citizens and meet future challenges on Earth
Go to topicMaking space accessible and developing the technologies for the future
Go to topicThank you for liking
You have already liked this page, you can only like it once!
On 4 March 2005, while approaching the Earth for the first of a series of fly-bys, Rosetta turned its navigation camera to the Moon, half lit by the Sun. This image was taken at 15:10 UTC when Rosetta was 428,061 km from the surface of the Moon. Rosetta is approaching the Earth from the night side so images of our home planet would only be very dark.