Earth ahead!

During the first step of humankind’s first-ever lunar-Earth flyby, ESA’s Jupiter Icy Moons Explorer (Juice) mission captured this stunning view of the Moon.

A closer look reveals a casual ‘photobomber’ – Earth shows itself as a dark circle outlined by a light crescent at the top centre of the image, peeking out from behind the spacecraft structure (look just above the fuzzy blue blob, which itself is a ghost image caused by reflection of sunlight).

The image was taken by Juice monitoring camera 2 (JMC2) at 23:15 CEST on 19 August 2024, soon after Juice made its closest approach to the Moon. This successful flyby of the Moon slightly redirected Juice’s path through space to put it on course for a flyby of Earth on 20 August 2024.

JMC2 was designed and positioned to monitor the multi-stage deployment of Juice’s 16 m-long Radar for Icy Moons Exploration (RIME) antenna. RIME is an ice-penetrating radar that will be used to remotely probe the subsurface structure of the large moons of Jupiter.

The Juice monitoring cameras were not designed to make science observations or image the Moon. A scientific camera called JANUS is providing high-resolution imagery during the cruise phase flybys of Earth, Moon and Venus, and of Jupiter and its icy moons once in the Jupiter system in 2031.

JMC2 is located on the top* of the spacecraft. JMC images provide 1024 x 1024 pixel snapshots. The images shown here are lightly processed by Simeon Schmauß and Mark McCaughrean.

Guide to Juice’s monitoring cameras

More information on the lunar-Earth flyby

Rewatch the livestream of Juice’s first Moon images, including Q&A with the team

More images from Juice's monitoring cameras in ESA's Planetary Science Archive

Access a version of this image without labels using the 'Download' button beneath the title

*Additional technical information: "top" means +Z side of the spacecraft and the centre of the field of view of JMC2 lies roughly in the XY plane. The -Z side of the spacecraft is attached to the launcher, which rotates around the Z axis during the ascent phase.

The Juice monitoring cameras were developed by Switzerland-based company Micro-Cameras & Space Exploration.

[Image description: Partial view of our cratered Moon on the left side, taken by the Juice monitoring camera 2 (JMC2) at 23:15 CEST on 19 August 2024, soon after Juice made its closest approach to the Moon. On the right we see parts of our spacecraft. Earth is also visible in this image as a dark circle outlined by a light crescent at the top centre of the image, just above the fuzzy round patch.]