Astronauts' most jaw-dropping photos from the International Space Station show what 2024 looked like 250 miles above Earth

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By: Morgan McFall-Johnsen

26 December 2024 at 02:45

two women astronauts with hair floating in microgravity look out an array of rectangular windows surrounding a circular window over a view of a blue ocean with wispy clouds — Astronauts Suni Williams and Tracy C. Dyson look out the International Space Station's cupola above the Atlantic Ocean.
NASA

Astronauts take hundreds of stunning photos from the International Space Station.
This year's best snapshots reveal both Earth and space in glorious detail.
Check out astronauts' views of eclipses, northern lights, storms, and Earth's grandest landscapes.

Every year, the International Space Station produces some of the world's best photography.

Astronauts tend to be technically skilled with a camera, yes. Many of them are engineers, after all.

Their real photography advantage, though, is the glorious view from space as they circle our planet every 90 minutes.

From blue comets and pink northern lights to snowy volcanos and winding rivers, the view 250 miles above Earth does not disappoint.

Here are the best photos of 2024 from the space station.

You simply can't beat the views from the International Space Station.

space view of a crescent shaped lake covered in cracked ice in a brown landscape — An icy lake in southwestern China's high plateau region north of the Himalayas.
NASA

So astronauts take hundreds of photos each year.

space view of a snowy arm of land with a circular volcano at its round end stretching into a blue sea — The snow-covered Onekotan Island, part of Russia's Kuril Islands, is home to the Tao-Rusyr Caldera stratovolcano in this photograph.
NASA

"How would you not want to take pictures and try and share that with the rest of humanity?" NASA astronaut Matt Dominick told ABC News Radio in August.

dark blue river winding with spiky edges and lots of branches and tributaries through a brown textured landscape view from space — The São Francisco River in the Brazilian state of Minas Gerais.
NASA

This year brought a special treat: the bold, bright Comet Tsuchinshan-ATLAS, or Comet A3.

white comet with a blue tail streaking through black starry space toward a bright blue horizon — Comet C/2023 A3 (Tsuchinshan-ATLAS), roughly 44 million miles away from Earth at the time of this photo.
NASA

Of course, astronauts also get front-row seats to the northern lights, aka the aurora borealis.

spaceship docked to space station module surrounded by bright pink and green lights amid a red glow with cloudy Earth below — An aurora radiates brightly above the Indian Ocean around the Soyuz MS-25 crew ship docked to the ISS.
NASA

In April, they watched the shadow of the moon creep across the US during the total solar eclipse.

dark round shadow covers large land mass on earth's curvature as seen from space — The moon's shadow covers portions of Quebec, New Brunswick, and Maine during the solar eclipse on April 8, 2024.
NASA

Earth's atmosphere offers other unique spectacles, such as colorful sunsets and sunrises.

earth horizon curving against starry space with yellow green purple and orange layers — NASA astronaut Jeanette Epps used long-exposure camera settings to capture an array of colors across Earth's horizon.
NASA

This eerie sheen is noctilucent clouds — extremely rare ice-crystal formations much higher in the atmosphere than any other cloud.

thin wispy cloud layer high in the sky above a dark earth with a dark orange horizon — Wispy noctilucent clouds in Earth's upper atmosphere are illuminated by the sunlight just after sunset above the South Pacific Ocean.
NASA

Even these gorgeous photos don't do the real views justice, according to Dominick.

two dark blue lakes side by side on a brown mountainous landscape beneath puffy clouds seen from space — Lake Rakshastal (left) and Lake Manasarovar (right) in Tibet.
NASA

"I've spent a fair amount of time trying to capture what I can see with my eye. I've not been able to achieve it yet," he said.

ring-shaped lake around a black and grey rocky island — Lake Manicouagan, carved out by the impact of an ancient meteorite, in Quebec.
NASA

Not all the views are fun or comforting. Astronauts can see wildfires clearly.

trails of white and brown wildfire smoke rise from brown wrinkled landscape as seen from space — Wildfires in South Africa's Great Escarpment, near the coast of the Indian Ocean.
NASA

Every year they get a bird's-eye view of hurricanes, too.

hurricane with thick clouds swirling into its eye as seen from space — Hurricane Helene above the Gulf of Mexico off the coast of Mississippi on September 25, 2024.
NASA

Stretching hundreds of miles wide, major storms like Hurricanes Helene and Milton seem to swallow the world below.

hurricane milton seen from space as a giant spiral of thick white clouds covering the blue earth below the blackness of space — Hurricane Milton, a Category 5 storm at the time of this photograph, churns in the Gulf of Mexico on October 8, 2024.
NASA

Astronauts can even see lightning blaring through the clouds.

cloudy nighttime region of earth seen from space with city lights and bright flash of lightning visible through the clouds — Lightning (at right) illuminates the clouds above the South China Sea with the city lights of Southeast Asia shining through.
NASA

One thing they can't often see is borders — like in this spot where Libya, Sudan, and Egypt meet in the Sahara desert.

orange sands sahara desert seen from space with some brown rocky-looking areas — The borders between Libya, Sudan, and Egypt meet in the Sahara desert.
NASA

Astronauts have long described a profound shift in perspective when they first see Earth from above. It's called the "Overview Effect."

an orange coastline against a blue sea is visible through a circular space station window surrounded by rectangular windows — The southern coast of Africa shines through the International Space Station's cupola, aka the "window to the world."
NASA

They talk about overwhelming feelings of awe, unity, and a sense of Earth's fragility.

long snowy mountainous island with lots of peninsulas and coves in a blue ocean seen from space — A snow-covered South Georgia Island in the southern Atlantic Ocean.
NASA

The actor William Shatner described it after his 2021 spaceflight with Jeff Bezos: "There's the blue down there and the black up there. There is Mother Earth and comfort, and there is — is there death? I don't know."

himalayas seen from space as a brown snow-lined mountain range fading into blue with the curvature of earth ending at the blackness of space — The Himalayas stretch across Earth's curvature.
NASA

"It really is difficult for me to imagine people on Earth not getting along together," NASA astronaut Suni Williams told reporters in September. "It just changes your perspective."

view from space of a river of bright white lights winding toward a dark sea under the blackness of space — The night lights of civilization highlight the Nile River and dimly outline the shores of the Red Sea, the Gulf of Suez, and the Gulf of Aqaba around midnight.
NASA

Williams and her crewmate, Butch Wilmore, have been stuck on the space station for months.

two floating smiling people stand between two astronauts in white spacesuits inside a small chamber lined with equipment on the space station — Suni Williams and Butch Wilmore (at center) pose with their fellow astronauts Mike Barratt (far left) and Tracy C. Dyson (far right).
NASA

They were the first people to fly on Boeing's Starliner spaceship for a roughly week-long flight in July.

spaceship with open nosecone in the distance against the blackness of space above a blue cloudy earth — The Starliner spacecraft approaches the International Space Station carrying astronauts Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams.
NASA

Starliner returned to Earth without them after engine issues made NASA officials concerned about its safety.

spaceship with open port backs away from space station seen through external station equipment robotic arms and ports — Boeing's uncrewed Starliner spacecraft backs away from the International Space Station on September 6, 2024.
NASA

Now, Williams and Wilmore are scheduled to return to Earth aboard SpaceX's Crew Dragon spaceship in March.

white spacex spaceship docked to a port with a smiling face looking out one window against the backdrop of black starry space and the milky way — The SpaceX Dragon crew spacecraft docked to the ISS, with astronaut Matt Dominick peering out of the left window and the Milky Way appearing in the background.
NASA

They've taken the setback in stride. "This is my happy place. I love being up here in space," Williams said.

green ponds lined up side by side with a passage through the middle in an orange-brown craggy landscape — Salt evaporation ponds south of the Dead Sea in between Israel and Jordan.
NASA

The space station's days are numbered, though. It will reach the end of its operational life in 2030.

brown river with thin brown tributaries curling through a green landscape — The Paraguay River separates the nations of Argentina and Paraguay.
NASA

NASA has asked SpaceX to design a vehicle to push the ISS out of orbit, to a fiery plunge into the Pacific Ocean.

long peninsula of brown land stretches across blue ocean toward the curving horizon of earth beneath black space — The Mexican states of Baja California and Baja California Sur stretch between the Pacific Ocean and the Gulf of California.
NASA

The ISS will have a "big legacy," Dominick said: "Look what humanity can do when they come together and work together."

great white swirls in a blue ocean seen from space — NASA astronaut Mike Barratt captured this image of sea ice off the coast of Newfoundland.
NASA

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Astronauts' most jaw-dropping photos from the International Space Station show what 2024 looked like 250 miles above Earth

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