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Space Science

Keep An Eye Out For The ISS 70

Posted by Hemos from the look-to-the-skies dept.
DarrylM writes "With the solar panels installed, the ISS should be visible with the naked eye.Heavens-Above will tell you when the Station will be passing over your city as it orbits.It also tracks Mir, some satellites, and the Space Shuttle."
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Keep An Eye Out For The ISS More

Keep An Eye Out For The ISS

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  • It looks like it also shows objects that have decayed (i.e. toasty!) and their orbit at that time.

  • check out the smeg and sattool at onegeek.org [onegeek.org] They are pretty cool.

  • Amongst other obscure Australian listings, Khancoban is a tiny village of about 300 people, and while it's one of the nicest places to waterski or catch trout I've ever been, it's not exactly a hotbed of astronomy or space science. Can somebody explain to me what the criteria were for entry to the list posted above?

  • error 'ASP 0115'
    Unexpected error

    /welcome.asp

    A trappable error occurred in an external object. The script cannot continue running.

    Server object error 'ASP 0115 : 8000ffff'

    Unexpected error

    /head2.inc, line 104

    A trappable error occurred in an external object. The script cannot continue running.

    AWESOME SITE! Asp rocks.

  • just have to say this is a damn cool site ;)
    ----
    "War doesn't determine who's right, just who's left"

  • SWEET! (Score:1)

    by log0n ( 18224 )
    This is going to be even more cool than when I got to see the original Shuttle piggy-back aboard it's jet carrier thing airborne over DC.

    Ok, maybe a little too much excitement in that title.. but still, this is very cool!
  • I've found this page [nasa.gov] to be pretty cool, it has a realtime tracker of the space station location overlayed on a map of the world.
  • The problem with developing with an asp is that it sometimes comes back and bites you... somehow I don't think we'll see Cleopatra promoting Microsoft technologies...
  • I feel like I'm in Star Trek...

    3D plot of satellites [nasa.gov]
    --
    Patrick Doyle
  • I submitted this information to slashdot several weeks ago when it first became visable - it just didn't make it to the page. :-)

    If you take a look into the South East Sky (and are located in the North Eastern US) you will see a very bright dot in the sky; that is the ISS. When looking at it I get a sense of accomplishment, just because I am part of the human race, and we have accomplished something so amazing. We now have a permanent presence in space - and that is phenomenal.

  • I meant to type "South WEST" sky. My bad! :)
  • Perhaps you should visit the webpage.

    I don't believe he's talking about any bandwidth problems, the site loads lightning quick.

    error 'ASP 0115'

    Unexpected error
    /welcome.asp
    A trappable error occurred in an external object. The script cannot continue running.
    Server object error 'ASP 0115 : 8000ffff'
    Unexpected error
    /head2.inc, line 104
    A trappable error occurred in an external object. The script cannot continue running.

    I always love to see "Error: Unexpected error." How often do you expect errors? My personal favorite has to be "Microsoft Exchange Server could not start due to the following problem: Microsoft exchange server did not start due to the error: Success." (Granted, the website error is most likely due to bad programming on the part of heavens-above.com. :)

  • The ISS has been a naked-eye object since the launch of its first module. I've been watching it, along with the occasional tailing shuttle, for the past year or so, all without telescopes and binoculars. The new solar panels will make it much brighter, however; apparently it will outshine Sirius and Venus, the brightest objects in the sky next to the Sun and Moon.
  • Where do you want to crash today.
  • But can we see it in New York? We have the worst light pollution in the world.
  • Even if it was possible to see the ISS during the day, the probability of the station being overhead the instance you read the slashdot article and looked up in the sky is pretty low.
  • "Error: Unexpected error." How often do you expect errors?

    "Keyboard Error - Press F1 to continue."

    And they say geeks don't have a sense of humor...

  • Actually, I thought that was interesting. I'd never gtten that error message from a slashdotted site before. ;)

    -J
  • I just went outside, and I CAN'T SEE THE ISS.

    Oh, did you mean "visible with the naked eye at night"?
  • I'm sorry, but both the Sun and Venus are brighter than Sirius. If it's the third brightest, that means only the Moon and the Sun would be brighter. Also, I think Jupiter is brighter than Sirius when we are close to it.
  • I'm afraid you can't just "look towards the south west" anytime you want to see it. Three conditions have to be met for it to be visible.
    First, it has to be above the horizon.
    Second, it has to be out of the Earths shadow, lit up by the sun.
    Third, it needs to be dark on the ground where you are.

    These conditions usually only coincide for a minute or two at most, hence the need for a sight to tell you when and where to look. The visual effect is a little dot of light moving briskly against the backdrop of stars, then snuffing out as it enters the Earth's shadow. If the dot isn't moving, it's not the right dot. I was lucky enough to see a shuttle in orbit near the ISS one night. Two little dots in a row!

  • This is exciting. I mean when was the last time the US has done something exciting in Space? Granted Apollo is hard to beat but... realistically this is definately within budget yet exciting at the same time. I'm still looking forward to that manned mission to Mars

    Nathaniel P. Wilkerson
    Domain Names for $13
  • Voice & Packet modes' downlink on the single frequency of 145.800 MHz.

    Enjoy!

  • Very cool - they use the same interface as Homeworld for panning! Pity they don't use Alt-Click to zoom in. ;-)

    Since 2001 is right around the corner, anyone else find it interesting that the Station is also called the Soyuz TMA-1 ???

  • Dammit, the site is already dying!
    http://www.heavens-above.com/

    oh well, what do you expect when the run ASP.
    ICQ# : 30269588
    "I used to be an idealist, but I got mugged by reality."
  • You obviously didn't read the message. Especially the bit about it being the third brightest object in the night sky!
    If you can see the sun, it isn't the night sky!
    Suspect you may be right about Venus. That is pretty bright.


    Hacker: A criminal who breaks into computer systems
  • This Nasa site [nasa.gov] provides a multi-use java applet that not only shows predictions for ISS viewings based on either a location list or long/lat input, but also provides a really neat star map.

    I haven't used it yet, living in Maine the elevations tend to be very low.
  • ...we'll be treated to a very expensive lightshow.
    ---
    Where can the word be found, where can the word resound? Not here, there is not enough silence.
  • Heehee... What do you want to crash today?
  • Ooh, yup, that didn't take long... It is a neat site when it is working though.
  • Wow, your so clever with your little dig at MS.

    But shame on me for pointing this out; we all know Linux/Apache servers have never ever been slashdotted.

  • Comment removed based on user account deletion
  • Comment removed based on user account deletion
  • millions and years spent on the ISS and it is constantly requiring construction and maintenance.. are you sure you're not talking about the IIS?
  • The ISS has been the brightest object in the night sky (atleast the northern hemisphere) for sometime now. It isnt just a recent thing (recent being two days or so), but more... a few months.
  • Did you guys try this one? I've been using it successfully for months.... http://spaceflight.nasa.gov/realdata/tracking/ [nasa.gov]
  • Even with all the troubles NASA has suffered us though lately, I echo your warm glow even when they get it even half right. This is a big deal even the most jaded of us should feel something akin to pleasure. Come on you know you want to!!!! -- Never trust anybody that uses multiple punctuation marks!!!!!!-CW
  • will it be visible through light pollution?

    Here in Salt Lake City, we can barely see the major stars.
  • I posted the story about tracking it some time back, but with the addition of the "wings" It'll be something easily seen with the naked eye.

    A number of the people I was traveling with, on our annual tour of Anchor Brewery (get xmas ale and glass) were former Lockheed employees. Just mention anything about the space program and they start geeking. :)

    --

  • 100 billion eh? Maybe evil mister bill will build his own space station to compete with the ISS. Eventually it will capture 95% of the market of ignorent stargazers. Then he will force any one who makes telescopes to pay him large sums of money and only allow them to veiw his space station. Bwuhahahaha!!!
  • heya guys,

    well, believe it or not, but it's really worth the time to check it out!

    This ISS stuff was some news item a couple of weeks ago (afaik),
    and I tried it...and....it really worked and it's very cool:
    Some white dot gets out of the nowwhere, moves over sky, and disappears from one second to the other. It's very impressive - you can see how far mankind has gotten ;)

    cya
    YerMaster

    You're addicted to the net when
    - You call 911 when your ISP goes down
  • They haven't installed the pannels yet.
  • I guess the ISS wasn't useless after all - several million dollars will give people something pretty to look at.
  • From the site:
    "If you're interested in satellites or astronomy, you've come to the right place! Our aim is to provide you with all the information you need to observe;
    satellites
    Mir and the International Space Station
    the Space Shuttle
    the dazzlingly bright flares from Iridium satellites"

    It fails to mention the "dazzling bright flare" from the Iridium satellite on Nov. 29th [slashdot.org]. Now that was a spectacle ...
    If need be, use this link [google.com] to see what I'm talking about or to see the exciting graphics at the bottom of the page.

    ---
  • J-track [nasa.gov]. i believe it's real-time....
  • no
    whos that
    email me
  • Comment removed based on user account deletion
  • Comment removed based on user account deletion
  • Comment removed based on user account deletion
  • See VA Linux Falls Behind [zdnet.com] at ZDNet News.
  • According to BBC News (link unavailable, go search the site [bbc.co.uk]!), the ISS will be the third brightest object in the night sky, after the Moon and Sirius. Of course, you can now expect an increase in the number of Goofy UFO Reports...
  • Maybe... BBC Science News ain't exactly the brighest object on the Internet, if you get my meaning... I'm just repeating what I heard
  • Even since Alpha acquired the Rus-hab module
    its been very bright. It was brighter than
    anything save for the sun, moon, and Venus.
    Probably it will be brighter than Venus next week.

    I've seen several times, some intentionally and
    some accidentally.
  • Best visibility is an hour before sunrise or
    after sunset. The orbit is inclined to reach over
    the US and FSU, but it doesn't always go over
    both every orbit. The axis of inclination precesses, so you only see it some the time. The further south you are, the more likely to get visible orbits.
  • Here is Google's cache [google.com]
    ---
  • Try the combination of these sites instead: To get your GPS coordinates for your address: http://www.geocode.com/scripts/eagle/eagle.pl?cmd= td_i Then plug the coordinates into the applet on this NASA site: http://spaceflight.nasa.gov/realdata/sightings/ind ex.html I've used it for my location and it's perfect! And what a pretty sight the ISS is, too. A little white dot moving across the sky at Mach-25 is just too cool.
  • I decided I'd take a look at what they have scheduled for the folks on the shuttle for the next few days. I found this site [nasa.gov] via NASA's ISS webpage. If you check out the official NASA itinerary for December 3rd (posted in a PDF file [nasa.gov]) you'll see that from 6:40am to 7:30am on that day, the shuttle crew has been scheduled for - in capitals - BREAKFART.

    I'm not sure what to think, especially given that this event occurs shortly before the, "Toilet breakthrough indicator data collection".

    Guess they're not as worried about air quality up there as I thought.
  • will it be visible through light pollution?
    Yes, easily. It's going to be one of the brightest objects in the night sky, about as bright as Venus.

    You should be able to see that even through some pretty severe light pollution.
  • I, for one, am glad the ISS will be visible.

    I may not see it every Night. But I know I will see it. And I know a lot of people will see it.

    Just the fact of people seeing it up there in the night will have a positive impact. This is because of something that the cynical might discount or might not have heard of.

    This is the power of dreams. And seeing it up there leads to speculation and to dreaming about what might be.

    Now of course, you might disrepect this.

    But I have found that the ones who disrepect this notion are often the ones who have most often have been disrepected themselves.

    Or sadly have had no dreams at all in the first place.

  • If you'd like to know when you can see the ISS - when is the viewing window for your geographical location check out this [nasa.gov] NASA site. The possible 'locations' are naturally Yankee-cenric, but it works very well nonetheless.
  • ... but the IIS got in the way.
  • Comment removed based on user account deletion

  • ISS (Score:3)

    by Bill Pela ( 4717 ) on Saturday December 02, 2000 @12:10PM (#586510)
    This 'wing set' should brighten the ISS considerably. It IS already visible with
    the 'naked or unassisted' eye, I've seen it
    about 6 times so far!

    And this visibility is only when the sun reflects
    off of it, i.e. just after sundown/before sunup.

    It looks WAY cool!!!!

  • Yeah, and it's available directly from NASA (Score:3)

    by gfilion ( 80497 ) on Saturday December 02, 2000 @12:12PM (#586511) Homepage
    Yeah, and it's available directly from NASA:

    http://www.hq.nasa.gov/osf/station/viewing/issvi s. html

    Also, little detail, it works...

    GFK's

  • Track Man Made Objects in Space (Score:3)

    by SubtleNuance ( 184325 ) on Saturday December 02, 2000 @12:24PM (#586512) Journal
    Nasa provides this [nasa.gov] applet wich you can use to track your favorite man made object in space - including the doomed Iridum sats & Mir.

  • Comment removed (Score:3)

    by account_deleted ( 4530225 ) on Saturday December 02, 2000 @12:37PM (#586513)
    Comment removed based on user account deletion

  • Straight from the source (Score:4)

    by Auckerman ( 223266 ) on Saturday December 02, 2000 @12:37PM (#586514)
    The supplied link is slashdotted, so.... Link [nasa.gov] for all US cities times. (>1MB)

    Link [nasa.gov] for all non US cities times. (>1MB)

    If you want to look it up city by city use the following URL formula

    http://www.hq.nasa.gov/osf/station/viewing/?.html

    US: Where the ? is the first letter in your city name (lower case)

    Outside US: Where the ? is first letter in your city name followed by the letter "f" (example for Moscow, the "?" is "mf")

  • here is another site... (Score:5)

    by hitchhacker ( 122525 ) on Saturday December 02, 2000 @12:11PM (#586515) Homepage
    that ALSO runs IIS.
    I hope it does better than the other one.
    liftoff.msfc.nasa.gov/temp/StationLoc.html [nasa.gov]
    cheers

  • Link to Previous /. story and Nasa Site (Score:5)

    by ackthpt ( 218170 ) on Saturday December 02, 2000 @12:15PM (#586516) Homepage Journal
    Article [slashdot.org] and Nasa [nasa.gov] (which does still work.)

    --

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