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The Jules Verne

After completing its mission to re-supply the International Space Station, the European Space Agency's Jules Verne Automated Transfer Vehicle (ATV) entered the Earth's atmosphere, where researchers captured images of its fiery end.

In the early morning hours of Sept. 29, 2008, the ATV entered the atmosphere above an uninhabited section of the Pacific Ocean, southwest of Tahiti. Researchers captured visible, infrared, ultraviolet and spectroscopic data during the re-entry. NASA's primary goal of the airborne project was to study the spacecraft's re-entry and compare it to meteor fragmentation.

The image was taken from high-definition video footage captured during the mission.