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ISS To Become Second Brightest-Object In the Sky

Posted by ScuttleMonkey on from the bright-future-of-the-iss dept.

Matt_dk writes "Move over, Morning Star. Once Canadarm2 helps install the fourth and final set of solar array wings to the International Space Station later this month, the Station will surpass Venus as the brightest object in the night sky, second only to the Moon. The Space Shuttle Discovery is set to deliver the power-generating solar panels and Starboard 6 (S6) truss segment to the ISS on the 125th mission in the Shuttle program, known as STS-119/15A (slated for launch on March 11)."

6 of 243 comments (clear)

  1. It doesn't matter for me by Daimanta · · Score: 4, Insightful

    I live in a city so the light pollution messes up any chances I have at looking at a starry sky. I have as a child always found it incomprehensible that people said that you couldn't count all the stars because I can surely do it where I live.

    --
    Knowledge is power. Knowledge shared is power lost.
    1. Re:It doesn't matter for me by DMUTPeregrine · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Yet there still seem to be a finite number of them, and they are thus countable. Not even enough to have to determine if they are a countable or uncountable infinity.

      --
      Not a sentence!
  2. Re:Second only to the Moon? by Locklin · · Score: 3, Insightful

    the Station will surpass Venus as the brightest object in the night sky,

    Is the sun so obvious that they don't even see it?

    Ummm... Since when is the sun in the *night* sky??

    --
    "Knowledge is the only instrument of production that is not subject to diminishing returns" -Journal of Political Econom
  3. Re:The Moon: A Ridiculous Liberal Myth by MrEricSir · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Well this explains why they shot JFK.

    But what I don't understand is why there are phases of the moon. Is that a bug in the programming?

    --
    There's no -1 for "I don't get it."
  4. Re:2nd brightest? not quite. by Maury+Markowitz · · Score: 5, Insightful

    > This still doesn't rival the brightness of an Iridium flare.

    Yes it does. It does already. You're comparing flare mags with standard mags. The ISS _does_ flare, and when it does it is much brighter than Iridium. Sadly, Mike Tyrrell's page is gone, but there was a collection of images there.

    Maury

  5. Re:2nd brightest? not quite. by LordSnooty · · Score: 3, Insightful

    I would say yes because the visible ISS passes are at dawn or dusk. I live in a similarly dense environment and had no problem seeing ISS and the Shuttle the last time it was there (in fact I saw the two orbiting just after disconnection, the Shuttle slightly ahead of the ISS and that was a pretty impressive sight). Just look up which part of the sky the pass will be for you and move away from any local bright lights that might obscure the view.