Spotting the Space Station

By Beth on October 8, 2007 at 6:19 pm | In Blog Posts |

Until I saw the movie “October Sky,” I hadn’t realized that people went out and saw Sputnik fly overhead 50 years ago.

Now, we can watch the International Space Station (ISS) and a wide variety of artificial satellites fly by. I’ve taken pictures of the ISS and Space Shuttle flying side-by-side. To me, it’s awesome that there are people living up there in space.

The Space Station is easy to spot when you know when to look and have good skies. Even a slacker can do it. It doesn’t zip by. You usually have enough time to find it moving slowly and steadily like a plane without flashing lights. It’s usually rather bright (around magnitude -1 to 1). Its shine is reflection of sunlight because it’s getting sun while you are in the dark. Sometimes you’ll see it big and bright and then “poof!” — it slips into the Earth’s shadow.

Visit Heavens-Above (http://www.heavens-above.com/) and find your location. Then under Satellites, click on 10-day predictions for ISS. If there are any passes over your location, you’ll get a table listing them. Realize that the times are in 24-hour time, so 5:47 will be 5:47am (too early for many slackers). A time like 19:54 is 7:54pm. Much better for slackers. Click on the date to get a map showing where to look. It’s easiest to see the passes that have a maximum altitude (center column) of 50-90 degrees but even the 15 degree high passes are readily visible.

In these crisp days of fall and spring, it’s fun to observe the skies above us with our own eyes rather than through a computer screen. Check it out.