If you live on the East Coast or in the southeast of the United States and the skies are clear tonight, stick your head out the window and there’s a good chance you’ll see the International Space Station passing overhead.
The unique spectacle will last a whole six minutes, and thanks to the bright reflection of the sun on the exterior of the station, you don’t need any special kit to see it. NASA says it’s easy to spot, describing it as looking like “a very bright star moving across the sky.”
Check out the graphic in the tweet below for precise information on when it’ll be passing over your neighborhood.
Live in the Southeast or East Coast of the U.S.? Tonight, if the weather’s clear, you’ll be able to see a 6-minute flyover of the @Space_Station across the night sky.
For more info & alerts on #SpotTheStation sightings, visit: https://t.co/MGJIkympUx pic.twitter.com/CQairfXb46
— NASA (@NASA) July 14, 2020
Orbiting Earth at an altitude of around 250 miles, the space station is currently home to five astronauts, including NASA’s Chris Cassidy, Doug Hurley, and Bob Behnken. Hurley and Behnken arrived at the end of May aboard the Crew Dragon in what was SpaceX’s first ever astronaut launch, as well as the first crewed launch from U.S. soil since the end of the space shuttle program in 2011. Behnken and Cassidy have been busy performing several spacewalks in recent weeks, with another one planned for Thursday, July 16.
If you miss the space station passing overhead tonight, or you live in another part of the U.S. — or indeed elsewhere in the world — there’s a good chance the orbiting outpost will be passing overhead in the near future as it continues to orbit Earth. This Digital Trends article tells you all you need to know to get a glimpse.
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