ISS & Space Shuttle Atlantis

Waited for the ISS last night and as usual it was right on time and nice and bright. The waited (in doors of course) to see if the space shuttle Atlantis could be seen.

Went out at about 12.50am with my dad and picked a spot that had a good view of the south. I'd been reading that it would be low on the horizon so wasn't expecting much of a view

Boy, was I wrong. At approx 1.am very low on the horizon I spotted an intermittent light which I thought was a plane. It rose rapidly in the sky at approx the same height as Jupiter about 1min after spotting this light (we still weren't sure if it was the shuttle) but there were 4 main give aways. There was no starboard light (the green one), no engine sound if it had been a plane, the sudden change in trajectory (turned and headed off in the same direction as the ISS 1hr before it) and last but not least we could make out the fuel tanks on the shuttle complete with the red lights at the bottom of them.

The whole thing lasted about 4-5 minutes and even though I had the camera I forgot about it. The view through the bino was fab (bresser 10x50 - lidl!!)

I'll be back out tonight to see the chase - well worth staying up to see

Yup, me too if the cloud clears. Can't beat binos for this kind of thing.

Anyone know how soon after the ISS pass we can expect the shuttle?

I'll be draging myself out of my sickbed to catch this!!
If you go to Heavens Above.com and select your location from
the database you can see charts of the passes of bothe the ISS & STS 117.
From here the shuttle will be 15min behind.
Good luck catching it!

There's a time gap of about 15-20mins between the ISS and the shuttle If you go to www.heavens-above.com you can get exact times for you area

Thanks all. Looking forward to tonight.

Sky looks good.

Spare a thought for us that will be working in doors and miss BOTH apparitions tonight!