Pages

Saturday, 4 September 2010

I think I need a bit more information for ISS passes

There's an ISS pass coming up at 21.45pm tonight but I seem to be missing either a bit of information, or the skills to understand the info below.

It's easy if the ISS is passing over close to 90 degrees as I just look West and look directly up and I'll see it. But the lower the degree value the further away it is from 'straight up' - but on which side? I know there are other sites on the web where you can get more information about length of transit and the arc it will sweep, but I don't think there's quite enough info below, especially if the ISS pass was at 23 degrees say. Or am I just being dense?
Is it a good one?
This time, the International Space Station will be flying over at 55 degrees. Its magnitude will be -3.2: extremely bright!
Where to look?
ISS will come up at the horizon from the west.
But on which side of the West?

I've drawn a diagram of me happily spotting the ISS (artist's impression, not drawn to scale you understand) at 45 degrees but what if I'd been looking at the other side?

No comments:

Post a Comment

Comment policy: I enthusiastically welcome corrections and I entertain polite disagreement ;) Because of the nature of this blog it attracts a LOT - 5 a day at the moment - of spam comments (I write about spam practices,misleading marketing and unevidenced quackery) and so I'm more likely to post a pasted version of your comment, removing any hyperlinks.

Comments written in ALL CAPS LOCK will be deleted and I won't publish any pro-homeopathy comments, that ship has sailed I'm afraid (it's nonsense).