By drawing the intersection of the possible scan plane orientations with the ecliptic, in the reference rotating around the Sun with the Gaia spacecraft, the two avoidance regions corresponding the the cones of Fig. 4 emerge inthe direction of the Sun and around opposition. The dashed line represents the intersection of the scanning plane and the ecliptic at an arbitrary epoch. During a single rotation of the satellite, the FOVs of Gaia cross the ecliptic in two opposite directions. The intersection continuously scans the allowed sectors, as indicated by the curved arrows.