ISS & Space Shuttle Atlantis

Superb images Frank! Must have been difficult to track accurately.

Yeah I was lucky to get anything really.

Did you do anything special to the tracking to get it to work ?

Yeah, . I turned it off!

The first pass the scope had the ISS bang on in the eyepiece...
at first...
then as it increased in altitude it lost it bigtime.

So I turned it off...pulled out the webcam, slapped in a 26mm and focused on
the nearest star.
Then just before she went out of sight I lined it up with the red dot finder and
managed to track it for a few seconds.
I was blown away that I could actually see a definate shape!

I mean, these things are 250 / 300 K up? and you can make out detail?
Thats amazing.

So I got ready for the shuttle and although I could track it..
it seemed to be just an elongated blob, faster too.
Heavens above was a little out on all tracks but I guess they are constantly changing course.

Next pass all I did was (using Jupiter) aligned the red dot finder bang on center so it was centered in the webcam image also.
This was tricky but worth it in the end.

So then I just waited for them to come around again...
The paths they took were perfect because you could see them a long way off
and it gave you a bit of time to line up the sight & click on the mouse to start recording an AVI, then
With the ALT & DEC locks off I guided it by hand keeping the
red dot centered on the craft in question.
(trusting the webcam was catching something every now and again)
This was almost impossable near zenith but thats where I just got lucky with the shuttle.


So..
Round two tonight eh!

yea, but its alot cloudier/hazier at the moment, maybe it'll clear off as the sun goes down.
I was surprised at first that you turned the scope off, but it makes sence when I think about it.
We cought the shuttle through the scope also, it seemed to be alot faster so it was harder to get in the eyepiece but when it was there, it had a wedge shape to it but not nearly as clear as the ISS. We used a 14mm UWA eyepiece which gives a magnification of 178.5.

Anyone read the article in the Sunday Independent today telling people about this event?

There is a nice photo of a young member of AI with a telescope at an observing session in Roundwood.

The article also states that the pair "should provide quite a spectacle for the whole of next week for the people of Ireland" It goes on "For daily updates go to www.astronomy.ie , or phone 1550...."

I checked out the website and is hasn't been updated since June 8th. It just gives out the 1550 number... Without trying to open cans of worms here, it seems the people of ireland will have to ring premium rate phone numbers for info that is freely available on www.heavens-above.com .

Either the author printed the wrong info or she was told a lie. I wonder...

I checked out the website and is hasn't been updated since June 8th. It just gives out the 1550 number... Without trying to open cans of worms here, it seems the people of ireland will have to ring premium rate phone numbers for info that is freely available on www.heavens-above.com .

I don't read the sindo but did it mention that its a premium rate number and state the charges? If not then its in breach of advertising rules.

As for the website, well I wouldn't expect sindo journalists to actually check a website had relevant content before publishing any more than I'd expect them to, well, research their stories astronomy.ie never lists the pass times.

If you feel strongly I'd suggest a polite brief email to sunday.letters@independent.ie or independent.letters@independent.ie

That said I didn't see anything from any other clubs in the papers or on the radio.

That said I didn't see anything from any other clubs in the papers or on the radio.

Thats a fair enough point actually.

I wonder is there a roll there for someone from IFAS as a PR officer.
Just to touch base with the media when an event that would be of
interest to the general public is coming up.

It might save a few people some wasted money on premium numbers
and the like.