shuttle visible tonight

[gsh]

For those who find this stuff interesting, tonight offers what may be one of the last opportunities to see a space shuttle in orbital flight. "Discovery" undocked from the ISS this morning and is scheduled to spend one more day in space before returning to Earth on Wednesday.

There is a somewhat favorable pass of the Shuttle and the ISS tonight just before 1900. The culmination point will be about 28 degrees above the NE horizon at an azimuth of 30 degrees. "Discovery" should lead the space station by about 10 - 15 seconds and will be a first-magnitude object. ISS should be quite a bit brighter at -2.0 magnitude.

Here are some tabular data concerning each object:

38.918 77.067 60. USNO, Washington, DC 2000 4.0 20 F F T T T
*** 2011 Mar 7 Mon evening *** Times are PM EST *** 1853 544

H M S Tim Al Azi C Dir Mag Dys F Hgt Shd Rng
37371 STS-133 0.1
6 58 33 21 350 69 1.2 0 2 223 169 539
6 58 47 23 356 72 0.9 0 3 223 159 505
6 59 1 25 3 75 0.6 0 3 223 149 476
6 59 15 27 11 80 0.4 0 3 223 137 454
6 59 29 28 20 84 0.2 0 3 223 124 441
6 59 43 28 30 C 89 0.0 0 3 223 111 435
6 59 57 28 39 95 0.0 0 3 223 96 439
7 0 11 27 48 100 0.0 0 3 223 81 451
7 0 25 25 57 104 0.0 0 3 223 64 471
7 0 39 24 64 108 0.2 0 3 224 47 498
7 0 53 21 70 111 0.3 0 3 224 28 531

Comments

[vvalkyri.livejournal.com]

if i get to GE before 7 will you be there to guide, or are you planning on watching from home?

[gsh]

I'm going from work to GE, not stopping at home first, so I should be at GE by 7.

[anais-pf.livejournal.com]

I think I already missed this. However, I take this opportunity to brag that I once saw the space shuttle attached to the back of its ferry jet, flying in a circle around the Washington Beltway as it made its way . . . wherever it was supposed to go. I was actually at work and standing in someone else's office at the time, looking out the plate glass window, and there it was. Wow.

[vvalkyri.livejournal.com]

thank you so much for posting this!

[gsh]

You are welcome. It was nice showing you the flyover last night. There is another one tonight at 7:24

[vvalkyri.livejournal.com]

sadly, I'll probably be inside. But what direction to look just in case? maybe i can look at a map ahead of time