An astronaut photographed the 'blood moon' from the International Space Station, and his pictures are haunting

Dave Mosher

Jul 30, 2018, 21:58 IST

An astronaut photographed the 'blood moon' from the International Space Station, and his pictures are haunting

alexander gerst german astronaut spacesuit nasa esa

NASA/Bill Stafford, Josh Valcarcel and Norah Moran

European Space Agency astronaut Alexander Gerst.

An astronaut in space captured haunting photographs of Friday's total lunar eclipse, also called a blood moon because of its eerie orange-red color.

German astronaut Alexander Gerst, a geophysicist and spaceflight veteran, launched toward the International Space Station (ISS) on June 6.

In the short time the European Space Agency astronaut has been in orbit, he's done some stunning photography of Earth and the moon.

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On Friday, Gerst watched and photographed the eclipse from his temporary home about 250 miles above the planet.

Here are a few pictures he snapped, plus some other share-worthy imagery he's recorded over the past eight weeks.

Astronauts on the space station see the moon many times per day because they orbit Earth about once every 90 minutes. It helps that their viewing platform is far above any clouds.

Gerst trained on Earth to use all the photo gear at the space station before he launched into orbit.

On July 27, 2018 — when the moon was eclipsed by Earth's shadow — Gerst was ready. The core of the planet's shadow, called the umbra, colored the moon red because of the way Earth's atmosphere refracts the sun's light.

The moon was in totality (fully shadowed by the umbra) for nearly an hour and 43 minutes. Views during the partial eclipse, when the moon is in Earth's outer shadow, or penumbra, were equally haunting.

Gerst managed to snap a handful of pictures before the blood moon wrapped up.

When he's not shooting a lunar eclipse, the German astronaut likes to photograph long shadows cast by cloud formations below him.

Gerst has also managed to record time-lapse videos of auroras on Earth.

"Alexander Gerst captured this time-lapse of a dancing aurora just 10 days into his Horizons mission aboard the International Space Station," the ESA said.