In true Israeli fashion, the first gift of Israel’s SpaceIL mission is a selfie snapped en route to the moon. The first photograph was sent from over 20,000 kilometers away from Earth, where only a couple weeks ago, Beresheet, or Genesis, was launched on February 22 from Cape Canaveral. The photograph shows the spectacular surface of Planet Earth with a close up of a postcard dawning the Israeli flag with taglines “small country, big dreams” and “Am Yisrael Chai,” which means the “nation of Israel Lives.”
The picture was taken as the craft orbited around Earth, and is expected to make its way to orbit around the moon before landing on April 11, which will reach its expected distance of about 131,000 kilometers away.
Beresheet is the first space craft built by SpaceIL and Israel Aerospace Industries. The spacecraft is loaded with a time capsule from Israel and other blue and white paraphernalia, including thousands of children’s dreams now beautifully floating around our solar system. So far, there has been one unpredictable resetting of the system, where the system rebooted and the engine shut down for four minutes. Despite the reboot, Beresheet remains on its regularly scheduled mission to the moon.
