If You Were There

Image Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech

I have a soft spot for conceptual space art — trying to capture what this probe or that lander will see, when it gets there. Since we can’t tag along with every robotic explorer, it’s up to the artist to imagine what we’d see. What a wonderful occupation! In this case, we’re shadowing the Stardust probe:

On Jan. 2, 2004 NASA’s Stardust spacecraft made a close flyby of comet Wild 2 (pronounced “Vilt-2″). Among the equipment the spacecraft carried on board was a navigation camera.that Comet Wild 2 is about 3.1 miles in diameter.

This artist’s concept depicts a view of Wild 2 that shows the faint jets emanating from the comet.