A fake solar eclipse? European satellites photograph ‘eclipse-making' mission
Launched last year, the Proba-3 mission consists of twin satellites sent into Earth's orbit to study the sun's corona, where the sun's atmosphere emits light and flares, according to the European Space Agency (ESA).
In March, the satellites accomplished their mission, and ESA released images of the artificial solar eclipse on Monday.
One satellite, obstructing the sun, hovered 492 feet away from the other probe, which aimed its telescope toward the sun's corona, the ESA said.
The satellites had to be perfectly aligned to capture 'images of the solar corona uninterrupted by the sun's bright light,' the agency said in its statement.
'It is exciting to see these stunning images validate our technologies in what is now the world's first precision formation flying mission,' Dietmar Pilz, the ESA's director of technology, engineering and quality, said in the statement.
The difference between these artificial eclipses and real ones is that artificial eclipses can be made every 19.6 hours that the satellites orbit Earth and can be held for up to six hours, Andrei Zhukov of the Royal Observatory of Belgium said in the statement.
In contrast, natural eclipses happen twice a year and last a few minutes.
This accomplishment gives ESA and other space agencies the chance to better study eclipses and the sun's surface, rather than wait for natural eclipses to happen, the agency added.
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