Astronaut Ron Garan works on assigned tasks during the last scheduled spacewalk of the STS-124 mission specialist. During the six-hour, 33-minute spacewalk, Garan and fellow astronaut Mike Fossum exchanged a depleted Nitrogen Tank Assembly for a new one, removed thermal covers and launch locks from the Kibo laboratory, reinstalled a repaired television camera onto the space station’s left P1 truss,and retrieved samples of a dust-like substance from the left Solar Alpha Rotary Joint for analysis by experts on the ground.

Busy day!

• Swift Gamma Ray Mission (NASA)
• RoSat (NASA, UK, Germany)
• CoRoT (CNES, ESA)
• GalEx (NASA)
• COBE (NASA)
• IRAS (NASA, UK, Netherlands)
• Envisat (ESA)
• Hubble Space Telescope (NASA, ESA)
• International Space Station (Many)

This KMZ file splits down into several separate files so you can chose to select or deselect any and all of the above objects. Clicking on the satellite or telescope’s icon brings up information about that object with links to more information. Screenshots below for those who like that sort of thing.

To see more Google Earth satellite files check out the general Satellites on Google Earth post and the Chinese Space Debris post. As always, suggestions are welcomed in the comments section. For example, I had created a time-slider dependent satellite tracker but it just ended up being really annoying. Would that be something people would want? Also, as mentioned in a previous comment, I am in the process of creating a tracker that uses a Sketchup model instead of an icon. All thoughts welcome, have fun playing with these.

The image here shows the view from above the North Pole of all low Earth orbit objects as of January 2008. To observe the Earth, satellites must be in low orbits. At higher latitudes, the density of such objects increases.

Between the launch of Sputnik on 4 October 1957 and 1 January 2008, approximately 4600 launches have placed some 6000 satellites into orbit, of which only 400 lie beyond near orbits or on interplanetary trajectories. Today, it is estimated that only 800 satellites are operational. About 50 percent of all trackable space debris are due to in-orbit explosion or collision events.

We are adding around 200 objects a year into this picture!

The image below, also from the ESA press release, shows all objects, including the geostationary ring of satellites that lie further away from the Earth’s surface.