woo, tangent » iss

congratulations to spacex, but sad pandas for humanity

lsd — Sun, 06 Jun 2010 09:42:20 +0000

Saturday morning marked a significant milestone in spaceflight: the successful maiden launch of the SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket. For years, spaceflight has been ruled by governments and the military, but SpaceX is shaking things up by developing rockets on a purely commercial basis, and at a fraction of the price of competing offerings. SpaceX has had success in the past with its smaller Falcon 1 rocket, but the Falcon 9 is a much bigger machine: with around 20 times the payload capacity, it’s more than capable of launching crew and cargo to the ISS.

Testing new rockets is always risky — the history of rocketry is littered with spectacular failures — and with Obama’s moves to invest in commercial providers to replace the nearly-retired Shuttle in the near term, all eyes were on this flight. However, most of the components had already been tested on the Falcon 1, from the avionics and basic construction and design, through to the engines: as you can see in some of the launch photos, the Falcon 9′s first stage uses nine engines, which are identical to the single engine on the Falcon 1′s first stage.

The next flight for SpaceX will be the test launch of its Dragon spacecraft, which will be used to ferry cargo, and potentially crew, to the ISS. That flight should be just a few months away; the Falcon 9 for that launch is already built, and the Dragon capsule itself is nearly complete.

This test flight did bring out some real craziness, though — people across eastern Australia spotted a “UFO” early on Saturday morning. Based on the timing, and the behaviour, including a slow spinning motion that was also observed in the live webcast from the Falcon 9′s on-board cameras, it must’ve been the Falcon 9. That hasn’t stopped a tonne of idiots jumping online with wacky theories, stating that it “couldn’t possibly be a rocket” based on their ridiculously ill-informed ideas of what a rocket is meant to be. A lot of the media hasn’t even bothered researching its true nature, instead being quite happy to perpetuate the UFO story.

What exactly do you call an Unidentified Flying Object once it’s been identified?

iss success

lsd — Thu, 03 Dec 2009 06:49:51 +0000

Conditions were perfect for watching last night’s overhead pass of the ISS, and I got a great view of it through my telescope. I think it could’ve been better, though — I used my 13mm Nagler eyepiece, so the magnification was perhaps a little high, which made tracking the ISS as it (very quickly) moved through the field of view very difficult. Even when I did get it in view and keep it there for a bit, it was still moving so fast across the field that it was all a bit of a blur. Next time, I think I’ll stick with my less powerful 21mm Stratus eyepiece, which should make it easier to both track the ISS, and to hold it still long enough to make out some good detail.

Speaking of next time, there’s actually another really good pass tomorrow night (the 4th), starting about 9:08pm. Here’s hoping today’s clouds have disappeared by then!

iss overhead tonight!

lsd — Wed, 02 Dec 2009 02:38:37 +0000

It’s a beautifully clear day outside today, and if it stays that way, I’ll be watching the ISS pass overhead tonight. The ISS passes overhead fairly often, but tonight’s showing is going to be particularly good, since it’s at a nice, easy viewing time (around 10pm), and it’ll be riding very high up in the sky, so it’ll be a great sight.

If you’re in Melbourne, and you want to check it out, head outside at 9:58PM and look north-west — you should very soon see a bright dot, climbing steadily up in to the sky, and growing brighter as it does. It’ll reach its highest point in the sky at 10:01, in the south-west, and then head back down to set in the south-east at 10:04. If you have a small telescope, or even binoculars, you should be able to make out some structure. Tracking it in a telescope will require quick movements, though!

If you miss tonight’s pass, you can get a list of other upcoming passes at Heavens Above.