Space Mission
Apollo 8, 21-27 December 1968
Photographer
Frank Borman
Photo Description
Vintage chromogenic print on fibre-based Kodak paper, 25.2 x 20.5 cm (10 x 8 in), [NASA photo no AS8-14-2392], with A KODAK PAPER watermark on verso
Essay
While the spacecraft orbits the Moon, the Earth emerges above the lunar horizon and appears in the window of the spacecraft. This is the third Earthrise witnessed by humans, during orbit 7.
For the astronauts, the most electrifying sight was the Earth rising behind the Moon’s bleached and lifeless horizon; indeed, all three felt that they had come all the way to another world to discover the one they had left behind. “The vast loneliness up here at the moon is awe-inspiring, and it makes you realize what you have back there on Earth. The Earth from here is a grand oasis in the big vastness of space.” James Lovell (live telecast from lunar orbit) “The view of the Earth from the Moon fascinated me, a small disk, 240,000 miles away. It was hard to think that that little thing held so many problems, so many frustrations. Raging nationalistic interests, famines, wars, pestilence don’t show from that distance.” Frank Borman (Life magazine, 17 January 1969).