Category:ISS

Photo courtesy of Pesquet-ESA

What does the Earth look like from "out there?"

Pesquet: When you look at the Earth from the space station, it's absolutely magical. You're not that far away, so you still have a relatively close-up view. But you can see the curvature and you see the atmosphere. It glows in blue. It is absolutely breathtaking the first time you see it. It's the most beautiful scenery you could possibly imagine.

When you're on the Earth, you feel that everything is so vast, everything is endless. You have a hard time understanding how limited we are. Then, when you take a step back and you see the Earth in its entirety, you suddenly understand that we live in an oasis in the cosmos. All around us is nothing, no life, blackness, emptiness, absolutely nothing -- apart from this blue ball with everything we need to sustain human life, and life in general, which is absolutely fragile.

It makes you want to cherish the Earth and protect it, the more you see it from space.

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The International Space Station, designed and built by five supporting agencies representing 15 nations:

the U.S., Canada, Japan, Russia, Belgium, Denmark, France, Germany, Italy, Netherlands, Norway, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, and U.K.

The International Space Station: The most complex scientific and technological endeavor ever undertaken ....