Crunchin' Keps...
Aug. 8th, 2000 11:05 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
alexpgpWhen conditions are just right, it is possible to see orbiting spacecraft with the naked eye. Tomorrow, we here in the Houston area will have not one, but two opportunities to see the International Space Station as it orbits the earth. (At least we will if my data and calculations are correct!)
The first opportunity will come at a few minutes before 5 am tomorrow morning. The ISS should appear in the sky almost due North about a third of the way up from the horizon. It will resemble a bright star and will travel in a pretty much horizontal line toward the east, fast enough to make it dip back below the horizon at a few minutes after 5 am.
The second opportunity will occur shortly after 9:15 pm. The ISS will rise from the southwest and travel toward the north, dropping back below the horizon at about 9:25.
The ISS will be visible because at those particular times, not only will it be within visual range, but we here on the ground will still be on the "night" side of the planet (so the sky will still be dark) as the ISS (which is 200-some-odd miles above the earth) flies out of the earth's shadow into sunlight.
I am not at all sure I will be able to muster the energy to get up at oh-dark-thirty to see the ISS (plus, there is the very real possibility that the data I'm working with is wrong, wrong, WRONG!, and I won't see squat). But I remember one morning back in 1994 while STS-63 was flying and I was still in Colorado, when I managed to get Lee up and we both went outside to see if we could see the Mir space station.
Not only did we see the Mir, but we also saw the Shuttle flying along behind it. And Lee tells me that a bright meteor flashed through the sky between the two vehicles (I didn't see it, being occupied with trying to bring either vehicle within the field of view of my binoculars...which was a waste of time.)
My other experience watching man-made objects in orbit occurred during the tether mission (I forget which one it was), after the tether had broken off and separated from the Shuttle. This time, I could not interest Lee in getting up early, so I saw the pass by myself, though I did talk to other radio hams in the area. The tether passed almost overhead, traveling sideways (sort of like a pencil rolling on a table). If I had not known that I was watching a long, thin wire flying along in low earth orbit, I'm sure I would have developed a long and abiding belief in UFOs.
What's also amazing is that the data to follow these satellites is readily available to anyone, as are a number of programs that will crunch the data and tell you when and where to look in your local area. I, in fact, did the calculations using a program that runs on my PalmPilot.
Well, it's off to bed if I'm to have any prayer of catching the station tomorrow morning!
Cheers...
The first opportunity will come at a few minutes before 5 am tomorrow morning. The ISS should appear in the sky almost due North about a third of the way up from the horizon. It will resemble a bright star and will travel in a pretty much horizontal line toward the east, fast enough to make it dip back below the horizon at a few minutes after 5 am.
The second opportunity will occur shortly after 9:15 pm. The ISS will rise from the southwest and travel toward the north, dropping back below the horizon at about 9:25.
The ISS will be visible because at those particular times, not only will it be within visual range, but we here on the ground will still be on the "night" side of the planet (so the sky will still be dark) as the ISS (which is 200-some-odd miles above the earth) flies out of the earth's shadow into sunlight.
I am not at all sure I will be able to muster the energy to get up at oh-dark-thirty to see the ISS (plus, there is the very real possibility that the data I'm working with is wrong, wrong, WRONG!, and I won't see squat). But I remember one morning back in 1994 while STS-63 was flying and I was still in Colorado, when I managed to get Lee up and we both went outside to see if we could see the Mir space station.
Not only did we see the Mir, but we also saw the Shuttle flying along behind it. And Lee tells me that a bright meteor flashed through the sky between the two vehicles (I didn't see it, being occupied with trying to bring either vehicle within the field of view of my binoculars...which was a waste of time.)
My other experience watching man-made objects in orbit occurred during the tether mission (I forget which one it was), after the tether had broken off and separated from the Shuttle. This time, I could not interest Lee in getting up early, so I saw the pass by myself, though I did talk to other radio hams in the area. The tether passed almost overhead, traveling sideways (sort of like a pencil rolling on a table). If I had not known that I was watching a long, thin wire flying along in low earth orbit, I'm sure I would have developed a long and abiding belief in UFOs.
What's also amazing is that the data to follow these satellites is readily available to anyone, as are a number of programs that will crunch the data and tell you when and where to look in your local area. I, in fact, did the calculations using a program that runs on my PalmPilot.
Well, it's off to bed if I'm to have any prayer of catching the station tomorrow morning!
Cheers...
