Europe's comet-hunting Rosetta probe caught this glance of the Earth and moon as it passed through our planetary neighborhood during a recent flyby. But it won’t be the last time the spacecraft swings past our planet.

The European Space Agency (ESA) touted this snapshot of the moon rising over Earth’s Pacific Ocean as the best snapshot taken by Rosetta’s navigation cameras during its March 4 flyby. The spacecraft maintained a constant moon-facing orientation during the swing past Earth, catching this image just three minutes before making its closest approach – about 1,954 kilometers – above the Pacific Ocean west of Mexico.

Rosetta’s Earth encounter will not be its last. After a February 2007 swing past Mars, the probe is expected to make two more Earth passes, the first in November 2007 and the last in November 2009. The multiple flybys will help the probe rendezvous with Comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko in 2014 and land the Philae lander on its surface.

-- SPACE.com Staff

Credit: ESA

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