Astronaut Donald R. Pettit, from NASA, shared this Sunday (16) an image of more than 20 years of São Paulo seen from space at night. The photo was taken in 2003 from the International Space Station, and shows the lights of the capital of São Paulo and a part of the city of Santos.
Pettit used his profile on X, formerly Twitter, to publicize the photo that he said shows a “patchwork of lighting.”
“Older mercury vapor lighting is seen as blue-green in the older, central part of the city, while yellow sodium vapor lighting appears in the newer regions around. The coastal region of Santos shows an abrupt edge of illumination in the Atlantic Ocean,” he wrote in the post.
São Paulo, Brazil at night, showing a patchwork of mercury VS sodium vapor lighting visible from @Space_Station.
Older mercury vapor lighting is seen as blueish-green in the older, center part of town while yellow sodium vapor lighting appears in the newer surrounding regions…. pic.twitter.com/uDFDToP6iR
— Don Pettit (@astro_Pettit) June 16, 2024
The photo was taken during the astronaut’s first mission in May 2003, when he was one of the crew members of Expedition 6, aboard the space shuttle Endeavour.
Now
, he is preparing to go into space for the fourth time in his career, on Expedition 72, where he will spend six months on the space station.
If all goes as planned, the astronaut will be part of the Expedition 72 team and spend six months on the space station.
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