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An Astronaut Asks: What Does This Cloud Look Like?

The image comes from Canadian astronaut Chris Hadfield, who gained fans last year when he he tweeted photos from the International Space Station, along with his refreshingly wide-eyed excitement at being in orbit.

Hadfield tweeted an image of an unusually shaped cloud with a question: "We all see faces & familiar shapes in clouds, even astronauts looking from above. Do you see what I see?"

The responses poured in, with many people referring to E.T. and the need to phone home. But other suggestions also had traction.

A Google Image search, which finds similar images to one submitted to its search engine, favored two images of cats' faces. The search results included Yoda and a manatee. And proving you can't predict what the Internet will do next, other suggestions ranged from legendary British TV series Blackadder and the HBO show Game of Thrones -- to a photo of Fresh Air host Terry Gross.

Hadfield took the photo from space; a similar image is on a global map of his pictures, says Dave MacLean, who created the map last year.

What do you think?

Copyright 2021 NPR. To see more, visit https://www.npr.org.

Bill Chappell is a writer and editor on the News Desk in the heart of NPR's newsroom in Washington, D.C.