What was supposed to be a stepping stone for the infamous Apollo 11 landing on the moon by the US, turned out to be the biggest inspiration for the modern environmental movement. Major William Alison Anders was one among the three astronauts to orbit the moon on the Christmas Eve of 1968 , for the Apollo 8 mission. The first humans to leave the Earth’s orbit on a dangerous mission, these three astronauts captured significant and awe-inspiring pictures of the Earth from lunar orbit.
William Anders, who was 35 at that time and the youngest astronaut in the crew, captured the ‘Earthrise’ — the first coloured picture of the Earth. Anders described it as a ‘gorgeous, colourful, beautiful planet coming up over the ugly lunar horizon.’, in a 2015 Forbes interview.
The picture gave the world an insight on how the Earth looked on the backdrop of space. Born to an American Navy lieutenant on October 17, 1933, in Hong Kong, Anders served as a backup crew for Apollo 11 but the Apollo 8 mission was the only time he flew to space. Advertisement Anders expressed later that he was at the “right place at right time” to capture the beautiful Earth which almost looked like a “Christmas tree ornament”.
While he was supposed to click pictures of lunar craters and approaches to future landing sites, he felt he could not keep the phenomenon to himself. “Earthrise isn’t that good of a picture if you really look at it, it’s not quite in focus. Photographers are probably jeal.
