My ultimate goal in surveying the night sky is experiencing the wonderment of the natural world and how incredibly vast it is. The program Stellarium helps me find remote Messier objects such as nebulae, galaxies, clusters and also comes with a plug-in that enables the viewer to identify man-made satellites. Up till now, because of lack of interest, I haven't used it that much.

However, after going to Florida, seeing the Space Shuttle Endeavour and then seeing it a couple of weeks after docked at the ISS, I have been obsessed in spotting it in the night sky! Unfortunately, there have been many conflicts up till now (clouds, time, school responsibilities,...)!

After reading a post created by Phil announcing that the International Space Station would transit the moon, I quickly checked the weather outside but the horizon was littered with clouds once again. About half an hour later, the Stellarium program highlighted the path of the ISS and I looked through my window out of instinct: It was happening at that very moment and the clouds were,.. GONE!

I had no time to take my telescope outside. The ISS was quickly making it's way across the sky and I have trouble taking "my behemoth" outside by myself. I therefore grabbed my birdwatching binoculars, tripped over a chair, uttered some words that should not be repeated online, and headed outside!

Most times when searching the sky at night, careful scrutiny is needed. Objects are usually hard to find but the ISS? I stood back,.. It was much brighter than I had expected! There was no mistaking it! With the binoculars I could make out individual lights. My telescope would have surely let me see the structure and some detail but the binoculars were all I had. It went by silently but it's light could not be ignored! Although I couldn't make out the structure, I could see the lights very well and it was awesome!

I screamed for my husband to come but by the time he made his way outside, there was only a few glimpses left before it disappeared over the horizon.

Now, lets see, the first two steps are done:

Step 1: Locate and see the ISS for the first time with the naked eye.

Step 2: See the ISS with the help of binoculars.

Step 3: See the ISS with my telescope. This will be a little hard since it travels pretty fast across the sky. My dobsonian will have to be set in a way to intersect it's trajectory.

Step 4: Capture the ISS with my camera as it passes by my eyepiece. Now,.. that will surely be a feat! I believe that the best way to do this would be with a video camera to then stack the individual video files into a picture.

For now, I sit back and relish what I have experienced. Feel like giving it a try? I recommend using this SITE (and Stellarium of course)!

Isabelle