“The largest human gathering in the world is well lit”: NASA astronaut reveals breathtaking images of Maha Kumbh Mela from space

NASA astronaut Donald Pettit, who is on board the International Space Station as part of Expedition 72, has shared spectacular images of Prayagraj glowing from inside with Maha Kumbh Mela 2025. At 69, Pettit took to social media on Sunday and revealed two amazing images of the vast city shining in the night against a pitch-black background. He was able to capture the scale of the world's largest religious gathering, an event of Earth so large it is visible from space.

In his post, Pettit, a chemical engineer and astronaut, explained that the pictures were taken in space from the ISS. They reflect the view of the Ganges River pilgrimage at night during the Maha Kumbh Mela in 2025. "This is the largest human gathering in the world, and it just shines so bright," he said.

The wonderful scale of the congregation was widely appreciated by Pettit's photographs. "The 2025 Maha Kumbh Mela at the Ganges River, captured by the ISS at night, shows the humongous size of this religious festival. Congregation called the largest human gathering on earth appears strikingly bright from space," a user commented on X. Other users questioned the dates for which the pictures were taken.

The largest religious gathering anywhere in the globe is the Maha Kumbh Mela. The gathering takes place at Prayagraj in the state of Uttar Pradesh. While the event will witness devotees amounting to over 45 crore, or 450 million, which indeed is a count much larger compared to that observed in any of the biggest carnivals of other countries such as the Rio Carnival hosted 7 million people, Oktoberfest in Germany witnessed an amount of 7.2 million.
With the gathering being of this magnitude, all arrangements are done in Prayagraj. More than 10,000 sanitation workers and 1,800 Ganga Sevaduts are deployed. At the health services, 43 hospitals and 6,000 beds, with air ambulances, make sure that everyone who has come is safe and healthy.
The pictures have brought out, beautifully, the importance of such a religious event as well as the technological wonder of taking pictures from the great space of the universe.
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