4.1.2 - Day 2: December 22, 1968

The next frame in the magazine we have another view of a still more rotated Earth, and this time it has moved far enough to allow an image from ATS-1 to be included in the analysis. AS08-16-2597 is shown below in figure 4.1.2.1 and compared with the satellite images in figure 4.1.2.2.

Figure 4.1.2.1: AS08-16-2597. High quality source:  AFJ 

Figure 4.1.2.2: ESSA 7 (left) and ATS-1 (below left) images compared with AS08-16-2597 and SkySafari time estimate. Left is a digital 3D reconstruction using recovered ESSA data from the NSIDC superimposed on a colour Earth map in Blender3D.

Although there is no land visible in the image, it is possible to mark the position of the terminator with SkySafari by using the previous image analysis as a reference. The weather system highlighted by the green arrow is the same in figure 4.1.2.2 as in figure 4.1.1.6, which means that the terminator is just about on the west coast of the USA, which puts the time at around 00:30 on the 22nd. This corresponds well with the ATS-1 image, which was recorded at 00:54 on the 22nd, and it is evident from it that the eastern half of the image is in, or close to, darkness.

SkySafari also indicates that Australia should just be visible on the western limb. This part of the Apollo image is a little washed out, but the magenta arrow points to a band of cloud that should lie off Australia's east coast and that is visible in all 3 images presented here.

The presence of that green-arrowed system is another clue, if one were needed, that this is a picture that is part of a continuous sequence recording the Earth as it rotates, and not some sort of made-up on the spot fiction. As with the other images, and as will become apparent for every other image presented throughout the entirety of this report, the cloud systems on the satellite images match those of the Apollo image. The ESSA path that most represents the terminator line is track number 5, which corresponds to orbit number 1596, which commenced at 22:05 on the 21st.

No specific mention of the actual time of  the photograph, but the transcript does have the crew querying what settings they should be using on the camera, and stating at around 01:00 that:

012:06:27 Anders: This PTC attitude really isn't the greatest for taking pictures of the Earth.

PTC stands for 'Passive Thermal Control', or the 'barbecue roll' slow rotation that allowed the CSM to balance its temperature in direct sunlight.

As before, we have some 16mm stills for comparison (figure 4.1.2.3). While there is no apparent time difference between the first still on the left and the Hasselblad, there is a clear amount of rotation evident in the next still.

While it appears that the left still was taken at roughly the same time as AS08-16-2597, the still in the centre looks (if the presence of a brown smudge of Australia is anything to go by) to have been taken a couple of hours later at around 02:30. The view in the centre is one  from the briefest of glimpses as it appears through the CSM window, but the broad details are still visible.

A few hours later we have the next image of Earth, again showing movement of Australia, AS08-16-2599. This is shown below in figure 4.1.2.4, and analysed in figure 4.1.2.5.

Figure 4.1.2.4: AS08-16-2599. High quality source:  AFJ

Figure 4.1.2.6: ESSA-7 image compared with AS08-16-2599 and SkySafari time estimate. Left is a 3D reconstruction using digitally restored ESSA data.

The rotation of the Earth in this photograph compared with the previous one is such that the ATS image no longer has any features that are visible in it, and the only weather system identified in the previous image that is also identifiable in this one is the one picked out by the magenta arrow.

The system picked out by the blue arrow in figure 4.1.2.2 can still be seen on the satellite image, just as the green arrow here identifies a weather pattern that was visible on the ESSA part of figure 4.1.2.2, so it is obviously a continuation of the weather observations on the day. The plume of cloud extending up from Antarctica (yellow) is very easy to pick out in the Apollo image, as are the streams of west trending clouds to the west of it (purple and cyan arrows), the 'Y' shaped pattern near the equator (red arrow), and the Himalayan clouds (blue arrow). The red arrow system is likely to Tropical Storm Beatie, which was active between 19th and 15th, while the system identified by the red circle is Tropical Storm Amber, which was around between 16-23rd of December. Figure 4.1.2.7 shows the tracks of those storms.

Figure 4.1.2.8: AS08-16-2599 (top left) with area show in the Corona image (right) highlighted in red. Crop of that area in the Apollo image (centre) and Google Earth image showing the location of the Corona path (bottom left).

It’s worth pointing out a few caveats here before drawing any conclusions. We have no real idea when these images were taken other than the date, and there are very few clues available to us as to what time of day it might be. The lack of shadows on the ground suggests that the sun may well be high overhead in late morning/noon, and as the next orbital swathe available shows shadows indicative of early afternoon this doesn’t seem too far out. The Apollo image was taken at 07:00 GMT, but this translates to much later in the day in the image. The local sunset time for North Korea at this time of year is around 17:00, or 08:30 GMT, so the Apollo and Corona images could be separated by as much as 6 hours.

Another thing to consider is whether I’ve accurately worked out which location is being shown in the image given that most of the coastal area that would help us identify it precisely is under cloud. We do, however, have the ESSA satellite image that shows us coastal outlines, and this helps us to confirm that the clouds skirt around the Korean peninsula, and we do have the location correctly identified.

What the Corona image identifies is an area of clear skies off the east coast of North Korea, with a similar gap between the clouds that next to this gap and the coast to the north. The Apollo image shows a similar pattern.

A couple of orbits later and Corona begins a pass over China that ends just east of Hainan Island. Close examination under the clouds on land show shadows angled slightly towards the terminator suggestive of a photograph time of late morning/early afternoon. Figure 4.1.2.9 shows the details.

Figure 4.1.1.9: AS08-16-2599 (top left) with area show in the Corona image (right) highlighted in red. Crop of that area in the Apollo image (centre) and Google Earth image showing the location of the Corona path (bottom left).

Again it’s worth bearing in mind the time gap between the two images, but as with the previous Corona pass the broad details are confirmed: the thick swathe of coastal cloud, some thinner bands just inland, and some lighter bands of cloud to the north.

The final pass visible in this image covers two sections stretching from Kazakhstan in the north to the Nepalese border in the south, as shown in figure 4.1.2.10.

Figure 4.1.2.10: AS08-16-2599 (top left) with area show in the Corona image (right) highlighted in red. Crop of that area in the Apollo image (centre) and Google Earth image showing the location of the Corona path (bottom left).

In this case the main feature in the Corona image is the large ‘C’ shaped cloud over Kazakhstan, and this feature can also be seen at the top of the Apollo image.

Also accompanying the Apollo still is a 16mm equivalent to the still image, and as with the previous image there is no apparent time difference between the two (figure 4.1.2.11).

Figure 4.1.2.11: 16mm still image taken at the same time as figure 4.1.2.4.

A couple of images later in the magazine we have another new image of Earth, this time showing Africa as the dominant land mass in view. AS08-16-2601 is shown below in figure 4.1.2.12, and analysed in figure 4.1.2.13.

The ESSA-7 image in that analysis is dated the 22nd, and the dividing line between those orbits that started on the 22nd and finished on the 23rd can be seen to the east of Africa in the southern hemisphere, running up Arabia and across eastern Europe in the northern hemisphere., The majority of the Apollo image is west of that line.

Figure 4.1.2.13: ESSA-7 images compared with AS08-16-2601 and SkySafari time estimate. Left is a digital 3D reconstruction using recovered ESSA data from the NSIDC superimposed on a colour Earth map in Blender3D.

As usual, the weather patterns on the satellite images correspond exactly with those on the Apollo image, and several of the cloud systems visible in this image will be seen in later ones, not least the spectacular 'dog-leg' frontal mass connecting the Antarctic to south America (purple arrow), and the large frontal mass preceding a series of thin lines of cloud in the north Atlantic (green arrow, although only the main cloud front is visible in this image).

Although the Apollo image is slightly out of focus, it is still possible to pick out the thin clouds over north Africa (eg the cyan arrow), the coastal cloud banks around southern Africa, the typical frontal system off South Africa itself (yellow arrow).

The astronauts themselves describe the view to the ground at exactly the same time as this image was taken:

025:12:41 Borman: This is a mighty nice view we have down there today. A little bit more than a half-Earth. Looks like Africa and the Red Sea is visible; we're not quite sure as there is quite a bit of cloud cover

SkySafari suggests a time of around 14:00 on the 22nd for this image. ESSA's nearest track to the terminator is track 11. This is orbit number 1602, which is labelled as the first orbital pass on the image dated the 22nd, and was commenced at 10:05 on the 22nd. The ESSA satellite would barely cover the area around the terminator before the Apollo image was taken, never mind the rest of the photograph.

It’s worth mentioning here that there are Corona passes available for this image, but as none of the areas actually feature any cloud there isn’t much point in introducing them to the discussion. The new digitally recovered and modelled ESSA data, however, is very obviously a perfect match.

The next image in the magazine, AS08-16-2602, shows that another few hours have elapsed, and south America dominates the scene. This photograph is shown below in figure 4.1.2.14, and analysed in figure 4.1.2.15.

Figure 4.1.2.12: AS08-16-2601. High quality source:  AFJ

Figure 4.1.2.14: AS08-16-2602 High quality source:  AFJ

Figure 4.1.2.15: ESSA-7 (left and above) and ATS-3 (below) images compared with AS08-16-2602 and SkySafari time estimate. Left is a digital 3D reconstruction using recovered ESSA data from the NSIDC superimposed on a colour Earth map in Blender3D.

The green and purple arrows in figure 4.1.2.15 point to the same systems shown in figure 4.1.1.1, and the thin swirls of cloud discussed previously are now clearly in view (red arrow). Similar thin wispy bands of cloud can be seen off the coast of south America (south of the cyan arrow).

For the first time in this section, an ATS-3 image is usable, and this is also showing an excellent match to the Apollo picture. That image was taken at 14:58, and it is evident that the terminator is much further east in that image compared with Apollo's.

ESSA's orbit best matching the terminator is number 1606 (track 2) which commenced at 18:05, just 55 minutes before the Apollo photograph, which SkySafari puts at 20:00.

Ostensibly, the ATS & Apollo images seem (terminator line apart) identical, but there are subtle differences. The clouds over the always dynamic Amazon climate system, for example, are in a different formation to Apollo's, where they are much more similar to the ESSA image taken nearer the time. There are also differences in the way the twin streams of cloud picked out in red are shaped. In ATS-3, they are much more definitely joined to the main bank of cloud (green arrow) and diverge more as they move westward. In the ESSA image, as with Apollo, the northernmost stream has broken away from the main bank of cloud, but there is a wider gap between the streams and they appear more parallel. This is a common theme throughout this research: ostensibly identical systems in fact showing small variations that are entirely consistent with the time differences between the images concerned.

Also available at this time was a TV broadcast that took place at 20:01 on the 22nd. A still from this broadcast (available here) that briefly showed Earth is available in figure 4.1.2.16 and as the people on the ground state in the broadcast it’s very over-exposed and no detail can be made out. It’s shown here for consistency, along with the same scene shown on the front page of a British newspaper.

Figure 4.1.2.16: Still from live TV broadcast on December 22nd and a newspaper front page dated December 23rd. Below right is a brightness level adjusted view of the Earth from the TV broadcast

The brightness level adjusted view of the Earth, where the excess glare is removed, is interesting in that it shows a very similar phase profile as the Earth visible in photographs taken at the same time, but without any visible surface features it’s not a truly reliable indicator of anything. Make of it what you will.

A short while after AS08-16-2602, we have AS08-16-2604. This photograph shows a very similar scene to that of 2602, but much of northern south America has passed beyond the terminator, and more of the Pacific is in view. AS08-16-2604 is shown in figure 4.1.2.16 and analysed in figure 4.1.2.17.

Figure 4.1.2.16: AS08-16-2604. High quality source:  AFJ

Figure 4.1.2.17: ESSA-7 (left) and ATS-3 (below left) images compared with AS08-16-2604 and SkySafari time estimate. Above is a digital 3D reconstruction using recovered ESSA data from the NSIDC superimposed on a colour Earth map in Blender3D.

As suggested previously, little has changed in the weather systems already shown, but it does serve to show (again) that the Earth is rotating as the CSM gets further away, and that that rotation brings into view weather systems that were previously hidden. There is no change in the ATS-3 timing, but ESSA's most representative track for the terminator region is number three (orbit 1607), one orbit later than the preceding image, and therefore starting at 20:00.

SkySafari suggests a time for the image of 21:30, just 90 minutes after the previous one, and all of the colours for arrows to identify weather systems in figure 4.1.2.15 apart from the green and red ones are used again. The reader is also referred back to figure 4.1.1.6, which showed the same view roughly 24 hours earlier, and where magenta is used to identify the same weather pattern. Those two day's weather patterns are compared below in figure 4.1.2.18.

Figure 4.1.2.18: AS08-16-2595 (right) compared with AS08-16-2604 (left)

The two days’ images show what is obviously the same weather system, but that has developed over 24 hours to extend further northwards, while a frontal band to the west moves further eastwards towards Chile.

Next up in the sequence of images is AS08-16-2605, and as will be seen shortly shows a relatively small amount of rotation since the preceding photograph on the magazine. Figure 4.1.2.19shows the original Apollo image, and 4.1.2.20 the analysis. The degree of movement is enough to mean that there is a small amount of surface covered by both ATS-1 and ATS-3.

Figure 4.1.2.19: AS08-16-2605. High quality Source: AFJ

Figure 4.1.2.20: AS08-16-2605 compared with ESSA (top & bottom left) ATS-1 (top right) and ATS-3 (bottom right) images dated 22/12/68, with SkySafari time estimate. Left is a digital 3D reconstruction using recovered ESSA data from the NSIDC superimposed on a colour Earth map in Blender3D.

We’ve now moved on a couple of hours, and the Rocky mountains are beginning to disappear into night. There is no direct reference to the photograph being taken, but roughly an hour later communications issues led to Hawaii being asked to send messages, suggesting that the Pacific view in the photograph is consistent (as we would expect) with the mission narrative.

The area shown is an intermediate one between those covered by ATS-1 & 3, but the blue arrow points to the same system as is shown in figure 4.1.214. The most distinctive weather system is that off the Californian cast, where two bands of clouds separate and then rejoin in a long arc (red and green arrows).

As the time suggested by SkySafari is 23:30. The ATS-1 image was taken at 00:54 on the 22nd, so is some time before the Apollo image, but as the next ATS-1 image was taken at 22:43 on the 23rd, it falls almost exactly between the two. This time gap is enough to explain the small-scale differences, but is close enough temporally to cover the large scale similarities.

ATS-3 was taken much closer, 14:59 on the 22nd. While not identified specifically, there is good correspondence between the Apollo photograph and ATS-3 in terms of the swirl of light banded cloud off western south America.

ESSA’s image is a much better match than either of the ATS satellites, as its orbital pass is much closer in time.  The closest pass to the terminator is number 4, or pass 1608, which started at 21:05.

The next image of Earth was taken on the 23rd, so click on the link below for Day 3.

Figure 4.1.2.3: 16mm stills and Skyfari time estimate for the far right one.

SkySafari shows that the terminator is showing a time of approximately 07:00, and this can be compared with an ESSA time for the orbit nearest the terminator of 02:05 (orbit 1598, track 7).

An interesting feature of this particular Apollo 8 image is that it was taken while a US Corona satellite was in operation.

Corona satellites were relatively short lived spy satellites launched to photograph enemy installations and troop movements. The film canisters were fired from the re-entering satellite and were caught by aircraft snagging trailing wires on their parachutes. Film at the time was a much better medium for detail compared with their TV picture transmitting counterparts, and the method also prevented the images being intercepted by unfriendly countries. The now declassified images are available here, and it is possible to download low quality versions of the image in a format that allows them to be superimposed on Google Earth.

One of the satellite passes is covered here in the context of showing how many passes you would need to get the same images taken by Apollo. On this image we have three areas we can examine. The first is over the coast of north Korea and China, and I’ve shown it below in figure 4.1.2.8.

Figure 4.1.2.7: Tropical storms Amber and Beatie locations.