Mercury Transits the Sun in New Images From Solar Orbiter
Mercury crosses the Sun in new video from the Solar Orbiter.Gif: Gizmodo (Video: ESA, NASA/Solar Orbiter/EUI Team)On January 3, the Solar Orbiter spotted Mercury passing in front of the Sun. The transit of the small, dark orb puts the scale of our solar system into sharp relief.Mercury is about one-third the size of Earth, and it looks particularly teeny next to the Sun’s 865,000-mile diameter. The Solar Orbiter is a joint mission between NASA and the European Space Agency; it launched in 2020 and takes measurements of…