Earth’s swirling white clouds reveal an often-turbulent atmosphere. The browns are landmasses, but mostly we see the blue of a planet covered with oceans of water.

But from space you might miss the most remarkable thing about Earth. On this world, water, land, and air have conspired to give rise to something astounding—life. Earth is teeming with life.

The diversity of life here is remarkable, from single-celled organisms whose world is a drop of water, to the blue whale whose home spans an entire ocean. From frigid Antarctica to the ocean depths, life flourishes.

Earth—home of the human race, and all known life in the cosmos.

— taken from the Earth storyboards, Voyage Scale Model Solar System Exhibition, ©2001

Continue the Voyage: Explore Earth from space in stunning clarity with the IKONOS spacecraft. One image is of the National Mall in Washington, DC, and includes the Voyage scale model Solar System Exhibition. Click here.

Credit: Computer-generated image created using GOES-8 imagery. ARC Science Simulations, ©2000.