Waved at Saturn? Maybe You're in the Collage!

Above is a collage of only some of the images shared via Twitter, Facebook, Flickr, Instagram, Google+, and email. NASA's Cassini mission team assembled the collage, using an image of Earth as the base image. Image Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech

People around the world shared more than 1,400 images of themselves as part of the Wave at Saturn event organized by NASA's Cassini mission on July 19—the day the Cassini spacecraft turned back toward Earth to take our picture. The images were posted online from 40 countries and 30 U.S. states via Twitter, Facebook, Flickr, Instagram, Google+, and email.

"Thanks to all of you, near and far, old and young, who joined the Cassini mission in marking the first time inhabitants of Earth had advance notice that our picture was being taken from interplanetary distances," said Linda Spilker, Cassini project scientist at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif. "While Earth is too small in the images Cassini obtained to distinguish any individual human beings, the mission has put together this collage so that we can celebrate all your waving hands, uplifted paws, smiling faces and artwork."

From its perch in the Saturn system, Cassini took a picture of Earth as part of a larger set of images it was collecting of the Saturn system. Scientists are busy putting together the color mosaic of the Saturn system, which they expect will take at least several more weeks to complete. The scientists who study Saturn's rings are poring over visible-light and infrared data obtained during that campaign.

The Cassini-Huygens mission is a cooperative project of NASA, the European Space Agency and the Italian Space Agency. JPL, a division of the California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, manages the mission for NASA's Science Mission Directorate in Washington.

Click here to learn more about the Wave at Saturn campaign.

Click here to learn more about NASA's Cassini mission.


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