William Atkins
Saturday, 21 March 2009 22:42
Science -
Space
Page 1 of 2
With the fourth set of solar wings just unfurled on the International Space Station, the orbiting space structure is bigger and better than ever. It’s a great time to be an evening sky watcher and see the ISS (with a space shuttle attached) fly over many towns and cities all over the Earth.
On a clear night, people will be able to go outside after sunset and see with their naked eyes the Space Station and the space shuttle
Discovery streak across the night sky.
With binoculars or a backyard telescope, you’ll get an even better view of the expanded Space Station, now bigger after 115-foot (35-meter) solar wings (both of them are about 240 feet [73 meters] across) were added and
unfurled like an accordion over the past few days.
The set of solar wing (a pair, one on each side of the Space Station), brought to the Space Station by space Shuttle
Discovery and added by the STS-119 astronauts, weighs about 2,400 pounds when on Earth’s surface and consist of about 32,800 individual solar cells.
NASA states in the March 17, 2009 Science@NASA article
Space Station Construction Visible in Backyard Telescopes that
“When the work is done, the space station will have enough usable electricity to light up 42 houses."
The NASA article also includes a picture of the Space Station taken by Ralf Vandebergh of the Netherlands on December 27, 2008, with his 10-inch Newtonian reflector telescope.
The ISS will be even larger, now, with the fourth set of solar wings installed.
Each wing adds about 4,000 square feet of light-collecting surface area to the ISS.
Page two has information on where to go on the Internet to find the nights and times that the Space Station/Discovery crosses your local night sky.
