For the past month or so, I’ve been visiting Heavens-Above.com, a website that takes your position on the globe and calculates when various low-earth orbit phenomena will be visible from your position. For instance, here in Austin, the International Space Station and the Hubble Space Telescope will both be visible every evening this week.
A much brighter and more localized spectacle are Iridium flares. These are caused by Iridium communication satellites which have a large, reflective antenna. Under certain conditions, which are precisely predictable, they reflect sunlight onto a patch of earth a few kilometers wide. This means that if you’re in the right spot, you’ll see the satellite glow at an intensity between that of Venus and the full Moon.
Tonight, the conditions were finally perfect. There were clear skies and a flare predicted near Austin. Julia and I drove out near the airport and waited for precisely 18:17:33. What we saw couldn’t really be photograhped, so I’ve drawn a picture.
Pretty cool, huh? It lasted for a couple of seconds and it was surprisingly intense, reminding me of a magnifying glass focusing the sun on the sidewalk, as seen from across the street.
Yeah, I’m glad I didn’t wake up at 05:30 to see one of these.
