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Discovery's Last Go Round, As Seen From the Ground
SoyQueSoy writes to point out this "incredible footage of the passage of the International Space Station and Discovery, taken on February 28th 2011 at 17:58UT from the area of Weimar, Germany. A stereoscopic 3D version is also included for your viewing pleasure, as well as footage from February 26." Perhaps as interesting is the hardcore home telescope set-up used to get the images, a motorized, satellite-tracking Takahashi EM400.
Love how stable the video is while the objects are traveling by at 17,000 mph. And what a great set up. Wow. Just. Wow. Wonder if there are some old Apollo parts up there still in orbit he can capture?
Am I the only one who hears The Blue Danube while watching that?
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The fact that there is no replacement with the capabilities of the Space Shuttle speaks volumes.
Good bye, old friend.
It's not tumbling; it's flying past, while the camera tracks it.
That Thierry guy is quite a master with a telescope & camera. He's also taken incredible shots of the shuttle traversing in front of the sun.
Just browse his website (assuming /. doesn't kill it).
I love it. That was some fantastic imagery. That just won "best link of the day" for me. Thanks for that!
The solar panels also have the ability to rotate and track the sun. Which begs the question of why they seem to be pointed in different directions.
"Never mind who we are. Your telescope is now classified Top Secret. Hand it over."
Obi-Wan: "I felt a great disturbance in the Force, as if millions of voices suddenly cried out in terror and were sudden
I am in awe of this. Best of show for that dawg!
The thing you have to remember is that the way the station rotates is completely independent of its position in its orbit around the Earth. It is not tidal locked like the moon. The station most likely faces the sun constantly. It looks like it is tumbling because it is orbiting every 90 minutes. If it has one side facing the sun, then from our point of view it rotates on it's axis every 90 minutes.
When our name is on the back of your car, we're behind you all the way!
There don't seem to be enough comments on this thread. Maybe I can draw up some interest. Natalie Portman.
Just jaw dropping cool.
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In Wikipedia, under "Geek Porn", there's a link to that video.
*** *** You're just jealous 'cause the voices talk to me... ***
Not only can the panels rotate along their own axis, like louvre slats, but the entire panel cluster can rotate relative to the axis of the station. The reason they seem to be pointed in different directions is that they ARE pointing in different directions. The panels are locked in place when a shuttle docks and undocks, so they are probably set in an orientation that gives them the most average power while they are locked in position.
When our name is on the back of your car, we're behind you all the way!
Way to read the fine print folks :D
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This is an honest question: Now that shuttle discovery has been retired, what exactly are they going to be using to dock to the ISS for both bringing astronauts and supplies to/from there? I read the wikipedia article about the ISS but it didn't say anything.. I don't know why this is such a mystery to me, but I didn't think other countries were actively launching spaceships to it..
If anyone knows the answer, it would be helpful.
I'm impressed Thierry was able to pull this off and with such good timing. In the future, it looks like he's just going to be able to look at the ISS and any Soyuz.
This post was generated by a Cadre of Uber Monkeys for Monkey-Man2000 (603495).
On a point of pedantry, it "raises the question", not "begs the question".
http://begthequestion.info/
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Actually, the station itself is always pointing the same way "down" and "forward", i.e. the windows of the Cupola pointing at the earth, the European/Japanese Modules forward. The solar panels can be rotated independent of the entire station. The Station appears to rotate mostly because of the change of perspective while it's flying overhead, much like you see the front, the side and then the back of a car passing you.
It begged for it. Listen......There.....Shhhh.....There again...... Such a slut question.
If you're going to be pedantic, the referenced example is actually wrong. The human eye is rather good an unconsciously identifying the "ugly" of humans. Commonly, in absolute terms someone can be "ugly" because they are slightly asymmetrical and yet consciously they would not be able to specifically say why the ugly person is ugly. Thusly, simply saying they are "ugly" would be accurate and accurately describe someone to which another viewer would immediately understand.
Accordingly, contrary to the link you provided, saying someone was unattractive because they are "ugly", does in fact, answer the question.
http://img546.imageshack.us/img546/4724/201103021949set.jpg
This was taken by Ralf Vandebergh, a contributor to the seesat-l sat observation list.
More astronaut spacewalk and ISS pics: http://ralfvandebergh.startje.be/
Tiller's Rule: Never use a word in written form that you've only heard and never read. You will end up looking foolish.
I completely agree. For all intensive purposes Slashdot needs to ban just these loosers and send them back to grammer school. But I guess some people could care less about useing proper english.
XVV (X-axis parallel to the velocity vector) as you describe, is only one of the attitude programs available to the ISS, and granted, it is the one most flown. During assembly procedures, the ISS was in an inertial attitude. The station can also assume a "down and sideways" or YVV attitude, with the Cupola pointing at the Earth and the long axis of the station parallel to the direction of travel. This orientation is usually only used in situations where the angle between the sun and the plane of the ISS's orbit is quite high (a few days in December, apparently). When the shuttle is docked, the ISS uses an X-TEA, X-axis Torque Equilibrium Attitude, which is similar to XVV (also known as LVLH). The mass of the shuttle affects the center of mass of the station, and the attitude control systems need to compensate for that.
For the most part, you are correct about the orientation, and your point about the perspective change is spot on.
When our name is on the back of your car, we're behind you all the way!