The Earth at night

In stunning new images of Earth taken at night, the Suomi NPP satellite shows how the lights from our cities illuminate the black marble globe. The composite image, taken in April and October, was mapped over existing Blue Marble imagery of Earth to provide a realistic view of the planet.

The nighttime view was made possible by the new satellite's "day-night band" of the Visible Infrared Imaging Radiometer Suite. VIIRS detects light in a range of wavelengths from green to near-infrared and uses filtering techniques to observe dim signals such as city lights, gas flares, auroras, wildfires, and reflected moonlight.