Very bright visual pass of the ISS tonight in SoCal. Do Not Miss Out!

The International Space Station The International Space Station will be making a great visible overflight of Southern California tonight. Tonight will be a spectacular “fly-over” as it will be almost as bright as is possible (the brightness is determined by how the space station – and particularly their football-pitch sized solar panels – happen to be aligned with the sun).

For those of you who may be new to viewing it the ISS will be visible as one of the brightest (mostly the brightest) star-like object in the sky as it passes approx 260 miles overhead at over 17000 mph. It will start low in the NW at 6:54pm where it will start getting higher (and brighter) as it crosses the sky towards the SE. At almost exactly 7:00pm it will be at it’s highest above.

Be sure to wave to the SIX astronauts/cosmonauts who are calling the ISS home right now.

More details on the pass here.

Posted in ISS

Animated GIF showing the Moons shadow crossing the earth during the partial solar eclipse on Oct 23rd 2014.

I love this animated GIF produced by NASA. It really makes it clear to me how the shadow of the moon falls across the earth during the eclipse.

Animated GIF showing the partial eclipse

During the late afternoon of Oct. 23, 2014, a partial solar eclipse will be visible from much of North America before sundown. However, it is never safe to look at the sun with the naked eye.
Image Credit: NASA/Sinclair

How to safely view the partial eclipse on Thursday October 23rd

When the moon begins it’s partial eclipse of the sun tomorrow do not look directly at the sun even for a split second – even with sun-glasses. One safe way to look at the sun is if you have special eclipse glasses like these.

eclipse viewing glasses

Eclipse viewing glasses

Or… you can build a simple pin-hole camera

Or… check out the live broadcast of the eclipse from Griffith Observatory

Partial Eclipse Phases

Partial Eclipse – Streamed live from the Griffith Observatory