NASA Spacecraft Captures Rare Crescent Mars Ahead Of Friday’s Flyby

NASA’s Psyche Mission has captured a striking new view of Mars as the spacecraft approaches the planet for a critical gravity-assist maneuver on May 15. The newly released image shows Mars as a rare thin crescent, similar to a crescent moon seen from Earth. It gave scientists an opportunity to calibrate instruments ahead of the mission’s eventual arrival at metal asteroid 16 Psyche in 2029.

NASA Spacecraft Captures Rare Crescent Mars Ahead Of Friday’s Flyby. NASA’s Psyche Mission has captured a striking new view of Mars as the spacecraft approaches the planet for a critical gravity-assist maneuver on May 15. The newly released image shows Mars as a rare thin crescent, similar to a crescent moon seen from Earth. It gave scientists an opportunity to calibrate instruments ahead of the mission’s eventual arrival at metal asteroid 16 Psyche in 2029. This colorized image of Mars was captured by NASA’s Psyche mission on May 3, 2026, about 3 million miles (4.8 million kilometers) from the planet. Mars looks like a crescent because Psyche is approaching Mars from the planet’s night side, from where only a narrow sliver of sunlight illuminates the Red Planet. The images were taken on May 3 from approximately 3 million miles (4.8 milli...