PERSPECTIVES ON A SPACE ODYSSEY

A Nasa astronaut’s out of this world images have lit up social media. Dean Murray reports.

AN American astronaut set to return from space is celebrated in a gallery of her amazing photography. Jasmin Moghbeli, a US Marine Corps test pilot, has taken social media by storm by picking out amazing views during her International Space Station (ISS) mission. The 40-year-old has captured jawdropping images ranging from spectacular tropical storms to the Sun’s first rays begin illuminating Earth’s atmosphere.

Jasmin commented on X (formerly Twitter), where she regularly gets tens of thousands of views: “Sometimes I can’t believe this is our planet, OUR home. How lucky we are to live somewhere so spectacular and alive. I will definitely miss these views, but I look forward to exploring more of our planet and the beautiful views from the ground.”

Fellow ISS crew member Andreas Mogensen, from Denmark, confirmed their return home, posting on X: “After almost six months on the International Space Station, it is time to go home. We have gotten the date for our return: No earlier than March 8, 2024 will Jasmin, Satoshi, Konstantin, and I enter our Crew Dragon ‘Endurance’ and undock from the Space Station and splash down near the coast of Florida.”

The return is dependent on the next crew’s launch on March 1 and weather at the landing site off the coast of Florida.

Moghbeli, an AH-1W Super Cobra pilot, has over 150 combat missions and 2,000 hours of flight time in over 25 different aircraft. In March 2022, she was assigned as commander of the SpaceX Crew-7 mission to the International Space Station. Her first space flight, the mission launched to the Space Station on August 26, 2023.

‘Sometimes I can’t believe this is our planet, our home. How lucky we are to live somewhere so spectacular and alive.’

STORMY: Category 1 Hurricane Nigel on September 19, 2023 on a northeasterly track in the Atlantic Ocean as the International Space Station orbited 259 miles above; above left, is the Soyuz MS-23 crew ship.

SPECTACULAR: Above, Moghbeli shared this image on December 23, 2023 and said: “Cygnus NG-19 cargo vehicle was separated from the ISS by the CSA ASC robotic arm. (It) will still spend the next couple weeks in orbit conducting additional experiments”; left, New Zealand taken on September 14, 2023.

OUT IN SPACE: Above, astronaut Jasmin Moghbeli aboard the International Space Station; right, the Sun at the Earth’s horizon on January 2, 2024; below, Moghbeli said of the naming of this Cygnus cargo vehicle: “This one had special meaning...as Patty Robertson was a member of the astronaut class of 1998 who was tragically lost before her first spaceflight.”