US space agency NASA has released an extraordinary of volcano as it erupts under a vast stilt vista. The photo features in NASA’s Astronomy Picture of the Day for bank holiday Monday. The long-exposure image, taken by photographer Diego Rizzo, depicts a volcano as it spews red-hot molten magma.
The volcano featured in the image is in Guatemala’s Volcan de Fuego, dubbed the “Volcano of Fire”.
NASA explained on the website: “On the land of the featured image, the Volcano of Fire is seen erupting topped by red-hot, wind-blown ash and with streams of glowing lava running down its side.”
And above, the Milky Way’s central plane is seen illuminating the night skies.
A meteor can be seen streaking across the skies just below.
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The trail of a satellite is even visible to the upper right hand side.
The planet Jupiter also appears toward the upper left, with the bright star Antares just to its right.
And lights from neighbouring towns are seen through a thin haze below.
And the stunning astronomical features don’t end there.
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NASA added: “The planet Jupiter also appears toward the upper left, with the bright star Antares just to its right.”
To create the incredible image, photographer Mr Rizzo treked to Fuego’s sister volcano, Acatenango.
Amazingly, much of the land and sky were captured together in a single, 25-second exposure photo.
However, the meteor was captured in a similar frame taken about 30 minutes earlier.
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And the volcanic eruption was added later digital superimposed.
The photo soon attracted scores of comments on NASA’s message board.
User Orin Stepanek was clearly impressed, writing: “I like the photo; lots of colour; nicely done!”
And user named Ann queried: What is the bright light at 10 o’clock? Surely not Saturn, current magnitude +0.3 (compared with -2.6 for Jupiter)?”
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