According to Space.com, there are now over 10,000 man-made satellites orbiting the Earth. A few hundred are big enough and fly close enough to the Earth that they are visible. This list includes the International Space Station (ISS) and NASA’s space shuttles.
In the case of the latter two examples, the objects are large enough (i.e. at least six meters in length) and orbit at just 240 miles above the Earth. This means that the sunlight that falls on them is easily seen from the Earth, albeit for only brief periods of time - the ISS can traverse the sky in just a couple of minutes. You can find out when to see the ISS in your area using the Heaven’s Above website.
These days however, the main satellite spotting buzz comes from trying to spot an Iridium Flare. The Iridium satellites are a large fleet of recent additions to the sky. They have large mirror-like solar panels (seen in image above) which are Teflon coated and act like mirrors, briefly reflecting a bright burst, or flare, of sunlight from almost 500 miles up in the sky. The flares range in brightness and can even be seen in the daytime, if you know where to look. This information can also be found on the Heaven’s Above site.
August 13th, 2007 at 12:58 pm
last night (8/13/07) we were watchin the meteor shower at ridgecrest/china lake, ca.
about 4:45 am we saw an object going north very fast. i thought it was a jet but my son thinks it was some sort of satalite. can you please settle this for us?
August 13th, 2007 at 3:58 pm
Aeroplanes generally flash as they pass and this is the first test of whether what you’re seeing is a plane or satellite. The other is its path across the sky. Was it slow and steady or did it appear to take a turn or curve at any point? If the latter is true then it may be a satellite, the former would make is most likely a plane.
Looking at the tracking from Heavens Above, I can see that both the Genesis 1 and 2 satellites would have been in your skies at around this date and time. They would indeed appear to be travelling North, visible for only 3-4 minutes and would have been at around magnitude 3. That makes them only comparable to a star of average brightness. If you were at a very dark sight then I would guess that your son is correct and this is what you were seeing.
Hope this helps…
June 1st, 2008 at 9:31 am
wow, 10000 man made objects…
is that 10000 actual satelites (machnines designed to leave earth, and ‘fly’ around the planet) or does that include ‘garbage’ aswell?
June 2nd, 2008 at 8:33 am
You may want to check out two of my later posts on the same topic for more information:
http://orbitingfrog.com/blog/2008/02/25/satellites-on-google-earth/
http://orbitingfrog.com/blog/2008/04/21/china-satellite-debris-in-google-earth/