SoylentNews is people
SoylentNews
Submission Preview
NASA: Sun Shining on Ice May Be Making Earth Sparkle
Science Alert reports [sciencealert.com] on the discovery, in images from NASA's Deep Space Climate Observatory [wikipedia.org] spacecraft, of flashes of light from the Earth:
[...] NASA detected 866 bursts of light between June 2015 and August 2016, and they were all coming from the land.
A similar phenomenon had been seen before:
Back in 1993, astronomer Carl Sagan noticed strange flashes of light showing up in images of Earth taken by the Galileo spacecraft.
[...]
In Galileo's images, they found large glints of light, reflecting like mirrors - but he could only find them in regions of the planet covered in water.
Previously, specular reflections from water had been offered as the explanation. Now, the phenomenon is supposed to be reflections from horizontal ice crystals.
further information:
video with sound [youtube.com]
related stories:
Video: "One Year on Earth" from NASA's DISCOVR [soylentnews.org]
NASA Releases Photos of Illuminated Dark Side of the Moon [soylentnews.org]
Something Different - Space Photos of the Week from Wired [soylentnews.org]
SpaceX DSCOVR Launch Postponed To Monday (18:07 ET) [soylentnews.org]
