[JoJo Gunn]

Thanks, Spunky.

You can see a little bit of a streak (at the top of the trail) where I pushed the shutter button instead of set the self timer first. Was excited to be able to catch it at all, I guess.

Used to be you could sign up at one of the NASA sites and they’d e-mail you the times to see the station, the shuttle, Hubbell, etc, according to your zip code, but they stopped it a year or so back. What I’d really like to see is the shuttle trailing just behind the station before docking. Time is running out for that, though. sigh

[19th LA Inf]

Your satellite photo brought back memories. In 1957, before the USA had launched a satellite, there was a program for amateur astronomers to take time exposures of Sputnik 2. The satellite trails against the background of stars were to be used to help calculate the orbit (so we were told). Track information was broadcast by shortwave radio, and the camera was supposed to be set up over a CGS benchmark, with the lens blocked briefly at a time hack from WWV. High tech for the fifties! I took my first one in January 1958 from the top of an oil storage tank in south Arkansas with the company 4 x 5 Speed Graphic on a tripod and loaded with Tri-X film. My boss must have told everyone he knew, and I got calls for weeks afterward from people wanting to know when they could see the thing.

Now I have a place out in the country with fairly dark skies, and I still get out once in a while to watch. My best sighting was once when I actually saw two fairly dim satellites cross paths simulatneously in the field of my 7 x 50 binoculars. Space is getting too crowded.