Another ISS sighting!

[Bryancd]

So this morning at 4:28am I was backing out of my garage, looked to my left and saw the ISS hustling through the sky! I haven't intentionally gone looking for it in a long time, so this was a nice, random encounter. I drove halfway down my driveway and got out to watch it cross the north east horizon. I also stood around looking for some early signs of the Perseid Meteor shower which peaks next Friday. I saw one yesterday morning. Love the big, dark sky's of the AZ desert!

[Bromptonboy]

Nice  - have you ever taken binoculars to the ISS?  How does it look?

[Bryancd]

Nice  - have you ever taken binoculars to the ISS?  How does it look?

I actually caught it once in my 8" Dobsonian telescope for a brief moment. It looks like a bright star. You can't resolve any detail and it's moving too fast to really focus in on it. I better telescope with a motor to track it can resolve the solar panels and even the shuttle when it's docked, there are some great images on line made by amateur astronomers.

In general it's luminosity with the naked eye is the same as the brightest stars in the night sky. It's not as bright as Jupiter or Venus. Jupiter is up in the am sky right now as well.

[billybob476]

This actually makes me wonder. If we can see light reflected from the ISS with the naked eye, I wonder how Spacedock would look when it passes overhead in the Trek universe.

[Bryancd]

This actually makes me wonder. If we can see light reflected from the ISS with the naked eye, I wonder how Spacedock would look when it passes overhead in the Trek universe.

It would depend on how high it's orbit is. The ISS ranges between 170-270 miles up. That's really low Earth orbit. Think about something which is 200 miles away from you on the ground. Doesn't seem that far really. Hell, I bike over 100 miles on a Saturday morning in under 5 hours! The ISS is so low that there is still some atmosphere around it which causes drag, slowing it down and causing to fall. They have to give it a boost every now and them to hold the orbital velocity with small thrusters or a docked shuttle. Space Dock in Trek looks pretty high up, like a couple 1000 miles at least.

[moyer777]

so cool Bryan.  I wish I could see it again.  Not sure when I can again.

[Bryancd]

so cool Bryan.  I wish I could see it again.  Not sure when I can again.

Here you go, Rick!
http://spaceflight.nasa.gov/realdata/sightings/cities/view.cgi?country=United_States&region=Oregon&city=Portland