Hello All: I thought some of you might be interested in a great NASA website which "provides sky watchers worldwide with a picture of when and where the International Space Station, the space shuttle and other spacecraft can be seen with the unaided eye as they pass overhead. NASA SkyWatch can also predict shuttle entry sightings. It may be used to sight other satellites, such as the Hubble Space Telescope, by using readily available two-line element sets."
Using information provided by this site, we observed the Space Station's passage over Tucson. It is VERY bright! about like Jupiter. Our newspaper says that when completed, the Space Station will be as big as a football field and will be the third brightest object in the night sky after the moon and Sirius! The site is easy to use but downloading takes a while. You will see that good sighting oportunities of the Space Station are rare. A good sighting is when the Station passes your location at a high elevation above the horizon (close to zenith) and lasts a long time. (The longest sighting I've found so far lasts about 3 minutes. A poor sighting may only last a few seconds). There is also a link to the Space Shuttle's daily schedule. It shows when the Shuttle docks and undocks from the Station. It will undock next Saturday on 12/09/00 18:45 GMT. The two spacecraft will fly in tandem for a while before the shuttle does its deorbit burn on 12/11/00 at 22:00 GMT. Both of these events can be seen from the ground! (You will see two bright dots traveling together if you are in the right place). Here is the URL of the SkyWatch website: http://spaceflight.nasa.gov/realdata/sightings/index.html (click on Start JavaApplet) Have Fun! John Carmichael Tucson Arizona
