{"id":199445,"date":"2025-12-19T03:11:14","date_gmt":"2025-12-19T03:11:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/199445\/"},"modified":"2025-12-19T03:11:14","modified_gmt":"2025-12-19T03:11:14","slug":"as-above-so-below-earth-in-the-sky-photo-of-the-day-for-dec-18-2025","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/199445\/","title":{"rendered":"As above, so below: Earth in the sky photo of the day for Dec. 18, 2025"},"content":{"rendered":"

From Dec. 5 to Dec. 8 of every year, France celebrates the Fetes des Lumieres<\/a> (Festival of Lights) at the Parc de la Tete d’Or in Lyon. There, the city hosts artwork spread across its iconic squares and opera house, including artwork made via drone.<\/a><\/p>\n

What is it?<\/p>\n

The Fetes des Lumieres is far older than LEDs, projectors or drones. Its roots go back to the 17th century,<\/a> when people of Lyon vowed to honor the Virgin Mary for protecting the city from plague. In 1852, the devotion settled on a key day, Dec. 8, when residents placed candles, or lumignons, on their windowsills to celebrate the inauguration of a new statue of Mary in the city.<\/p>\n

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Over time, the religious event became much more urbanized, and in modern times<\/a> now uses projectors, LEDs, and even drones to light up the night sky. By the 2000s, the festival had become world-famous, attracts millions of visitors to Lyon every December.<\/p>\n

You may like<\/p>\n

Where is it?<\/p>\n

This image was taken at the Parc de la Tete d’Or in Lyon, which is in central-eastern France.<\/p>\n

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A view of our home planet made by drones. (Image credit: ALEX MARTIN\/Getty Images)Why is it amazing?<\/p>\n

This year’s celebration included a “ballet” of 500 synchronized drones<\/a>working together to make distinct shapes in France’s night sky, including this model of planet Earth<\/a>. Each performance lasted about eight to 10 minutes, with shows beginning every 30 minutes to allow the drones’ batteries to recharge. This image captures two moments in time, a centuries old tradition meeting cutting-edge technology to give spectators a dazzling wintry show they would never forget.<\/p>\n

Want to learn more?<\/p>\n

You can learn more about drone technology <\/a>and LEDs.<\/a><\/p>\n

Breaking space news, the latest updates on rocket launches, skywatching events and more!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"From Dec. 5 to Dec. 8 of every year, France celebrates the Fetes des Lumieres (Festival of Lights)…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":199446,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[23],"tags":[61,60,82,247],"class_list":{"0":"post-199445","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-space","8":"tag-ie","9":"tag-ireland","10":"tag-science","11":"tag-space"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/199445","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=199445"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/199445\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/199446"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=199445"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=199445"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=199445"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}