The American Solar Eclipse as Seen From the Moon

We've seen many great pictures of the Solar Eclipse taken from here on Earth but here's one from NASA's Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter showing the Eclipse just north of Nashville where totality was at its longest.

As LRO crossed the lunar south pole heading north at 3,579 mph (1,600 meters per second), the shadow of the Moon was racing across the United States at 1,500 mph (670 meters per second)
A few minutes later, LRO began a slow 180-degree turn to look back at Earth, capturing an image of the eclipse very near the location where totality lasted the longest. The spacecraft’s Narrow Angle Camera began scanning Earth at 2:25:30 p.m. EDT (18:25:30 UTC) and completed the image 18 seconds later.
www.nasa.gov...

so, the LRO can get those shots

why then havent we gotten those before

originally posted by: GBP/JPY
so, the LRO can get those shots

why then havent we gotten those before

Because the primary mission of the LRO is to take details images of the lunar surface for geological analysis. They had to make the orbiter and relay station do a 180 degree flip so that it could look back at Earth. That would probably have required special approval and permission to take photographs of Earth from the Moon.

lunar.gsfc.nasa.gov...

a reply to: GBP/JPY

It isn't really what the LRO is for but I guess given the rarity of the occasion and it being on home turf for NASA the opportunity was there for the taking.

Pretty cool, regardless. I couldn't see it here - unfortunately Mama Nature decided we needed a thunderstorm at that particular moment. Sigh....

a reply to: GBP/JPY

cause we already have an lot of earth watching sats why another one?

originally posted by: humanoidlord
a reply to: GBP/JPY

cause we already have an lot of earth watching sats why another one?

Because very few if any have a complete view of the Earth. Most satellites are in geo-synchronous orbit watching a particular ocean. Here is GOES-16:

cimss.ssec.wisc.edu...

That's a great shot! I immediately remembered about the EPIC camera that takes similar images, but from 1 million miles away. So I decided to try to colourise the LRO image using the EPIC image taken almost at the same time:

Here's the result (which I had to crop as the two images don't align very well)

originally posted by: GBP/JPY
so, the LRO can get those shots

why then havent we gotten those before

Good question and no good answers.

a reply to: toysforadults

You mean besides it being the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter, and not the Earth Reconnaissance Orbiter? Why would they look at the earth with it, when it's up there to map the moon, without a good reason? It takes fuel to turn it around, and that means less fuel for orbiting the moon, which shortens the mission time.

a reply to: toysforadults

The answer is literally in this thread.

originally posted by: GBP/JPY
so, the LRO can get those shots

why then havent we gotten those before

They have.

lroc.sese.asu.edu...

lroc.sese.asu.edu...

and

lroc.sese.asu.edu...

a reply to: stormcell

theres the one carrying the EPIC camera too

originally posted by: GBP/JPY
so, the LRO can get those shots

why then havent we gotten those before

Just because it CAN be done doesn't mean it should be.

Why should it be done all the time is the better question.