Computer Generated View of Earth as seen from the Asteroid Toutatis

WASHINGTON, DC, UNITED STATES

10.14.2009

Courtesy Photo

NASA

This computer generated image depicts a view of Earth as seen from the surface of the asteroid Toutatis on Nov 29th 1996. A 2.5 degree field-of-view synthetic computer camera was used for this simulation. Toutatis is visible on this date as a twelfth magnitude object in the night sky in the constellation of Virgo and could be viewed with a medium sized telescope. Toutatis currently approaches Earth once every four years and, on Nov. 29th, 1996 will be 5.2 million kilometers away (approx. 3.3 million miles). In approximately 8 years, on Sept. 29th, 2004, it will be less than 1.6 million kilometers from Earth. This is only 4 times the distance to the moon, and is the closest approach predicted for any known asteroid or comet during the next 60 years.

NASA Identifier: PLAN-PIA00515

• Date Taken: 10.14.2009
• Date Posted: 10.10.2012 16:41
• Photo ID: 709762
• Resolution: 1536x1152
• Size: 76.56 KB
• Location: WASHINGTON, DC, US