finally...

Last night, a few minutes before 10pm, at an azimuth of 75 degrees and an altitude of about 30 degrees, I think I saw an Iridium Flare! It was a brief flash of linear light that caught my eye as I was peering at the stars. I double checked online and it appears I saw Iridium 86. It happened quickly and I wasn't expecting it, so I wasn't able to get a picture. Here, however, is what an iridium flare looks like:



Yesterday I looked at CalSky and found that there would be a satellite visible around 1:45am this morning. So, after a long night of homework and projects, I decided to go out and take a peak. At about 1:50am, at an altitude of about 80 degrees and an azimuth of 130 degrees, I think I saw the Lacrosse 5 satellite! It looked just like the moving bright spot I saw the other day, so I'm thinking that was a satellite too. Either way, despite my absolute exhaustion, I was pretty excited to see the satellite! At about 6:10AM this morning (I know, I definitely didn't get my 8 hours), I saw a bright light drifting across the sky from the northwest horizon to the east horizon. It got as high as about 20degrees above the horizon, and it was visible for several minutes. I checked out this bright light on CalSky and it seems to have been the International Space Station! How crazy to think about people living on that little speck in the sky. The more time I spend with my eyes to sky, the more insignificant I feel. Not in a bad way... but in a "wow, what an amazing universe" kind of way.