How to find the International Space Station on the night sky?
Hey Steemers!
Have you ever looked up to the stars and seen a very bright, very fast moving object?
Chances are likely that you saw the ISS or another bright satellite.
If you want to see the ISS with your own eyes, you do not have to rely on your luck but you can rather use a tool called
http://heavens-above.com
It will show you the visible passes of the ISS as well as predictions for brighter satellites.
The first module of the ISS was launched in 1998 and the first resident crew arrived in November 2000. Today it´s the largest human-made body in low Earth orbit.
One can get very nice views from up there.
But for now, let´s find out how to track the visible passes of the ISS at your location here on planet Earth.
Having arrived there we need to "change our observing location"
It´s import to confirm your change of observing location by clicking the "update" button
Now we can click on one of the satellites we want to observe, let´s say ISS is our choice
The passes are all very bright because their brightness is below 0 magnitudes (magnitude explained) The "Az." will give you the cardinal point where the ISS will rise, culminate or finally descend. The "Time" will give you the exact time of when it´s happening. The "Alt" gives you the height above the horizon.
Here you can see the ISS live http://www.ustream.tv/channel/iss-hdev-payload
Thanks for dropping by
Great info! We are often spotting the ISS and use the ISS Spotter App, which is very easy, with a map showing the actual position as well as the route. It provides even future passes announcements and alarm feature:
Make a right click "open in new window" to see larger picture.
Wow that's a nice app, didn't know that it exists.. But of course there's an app for everything now here on the planet 😀 thx for the input!
My pleasure! It's always fun, when the ISS passes, kind of family event sometimes.
Have a nice day!
I have actually done this a few times when I was hoping that some moving object on the sky was the ISS. But it never was, if I remember correctly :(
Well there are dozens of other bright satellites orbiting Earth, maybe it was one of them?!
But of course not every bright object has to be a satellite, only if they are moving linearly 😊
Yeah, probably!
I was spotting the ISS many times, using another source and getting notification on my e-mail.
This is the link
https://spotthestation.nasa.gov/
I wil check Heavens above too. It looks very useful. Thanks for sharing.
thx for letting me know! didn´t know the spotthestation hp, but couldn´t handle it as well :D see you in the skies!
See you there 😀 Shame tonight we have no clear sky. The scope shall stay indoors.
I like toast 🍞
I don't 😈
I like toast 🍞
Understood 😁
I like toast 🍞
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Thanks I wonder what it must be like up there. Imagine if we could go on vacations there....
Hm guess it's agravic :-D for vacation it's fine, for living I prefer good old earth
I like earth too. Great place. But at the same time gravity is kinda weird too if you think about it. Why should we be stuck like this. Its so funny in movies when they are in space ship and then the press the gravity switch. OK, artificial gravity activated! Like in guardians of galaxy i think they did that.