Yesterday, I posted a short video I took of the ISS passing over Ottawa this past Tuesday evening, so I thought I’d post a copy of long exposure photos that I took.

I used my digital Canon Rebel on a tripod that I sat on the roof of my SUV. Generally, I had the ISO set to 1600, stopped the lens down to about f/20 and manually selected a 30 second exposure. The autofocus was turned off and I manually set the focus to ~infinity and confirmed it the stars were in focus with some test shots. I have a small wireless remote that I used to trigger the shutter. To avoid condensation problems, I set things up about half an hour before the pass to allow the camera to cool down.

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I headed out Tuesday evening to watch the space shuttle and International Space Station pass overhead. Both of them appeared on schedule and I was able to capture them in some long exposure photos.

About a minute before the ISS disappeared from view I grabbed my Canon SD850IS and captured a short video of the pass. I’m quite happy with the results and have posted the video to YouTube. It’s probably best viewed in full screen mode.

I’ve crunched some more precise numbers for this evening’s ISS and STS-133 passes. The times are in UTC, so you need to subtract 5 hours for Eastern Standard time. (Click here to download them in a text file.)

Ottawa-To-ISS
Time (UTCG)                Azimuth (deg)    Elevation (deg)    Range (km)
-----------------------    -------------    ---------------    -----------
9 Mar 2011 00:20:38.123              292                  0    2159.492211
9 Mar 2011 00:21:38.000              287                  4    1765.477591
9 Mar 2011 00:22:38.000              280                  9    1389.558028
9 Mar 2011 00:23:38.000              267                 15    1055.451478
9 Mar 2011 00:24:38.000              244                 22     818.373598
9 Mar 2011 00:25:38.000              209                 24     774.603489
9 Mar 2011 00:26:38.000              180                 18     951.326850
9 Mar 2011 00:27:38.000              164                 11    1258.305207
9 Mar 2011 00:28:38.000              156                  6    1622.294953
9 Mar 2011 00:29:38.000              150                  1    2011.420073
9 Mar 2011 00:29:58.922              149                  0    2150.274764

Ottawa-To-STS-133
Time (UTCG)                Azimuth (deg)    Elevation (deg)     Range (km)
-----------------------    -------------    ---------------    -----------
9 Mar 2011 00:20:05.553              292                  0    2159.008371
9 Mar 2011 00:21:05.000              287                  4    1767.294751
9 Mar 2011 00:22:05.000              280                  9    1390.441394
9 Mar 2011 00:23:05.000              268                 15    1054.707599
9 Mar 2011 00:24:05.000              244                 23     814.906252
9 Mar 2011 00:25:05.000              209                 24     768.231806
9 Mar 2011 00:26:05.000              180                 18     943.899552
9 Mar 2011 00:27:05.000              164                 11    1250.970718
9 Mar 2011 00:28:05.000              155                  6    1615.247805
9 Mar 2011 00:29:05.000              150                  1    2004.620053
9 Mar 2011 00:29:27.464              149                  0    2153.829615

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The International Space Station and the Space Shuttle Discovery will be passing over Ottawa the next couple of days and, weather-permitting, there should be a couple of opportunities to see them as they pass overhead.

You won’t need any fancy equipment to view them. They’ll look like a pair of bright dots, one chasing the other across the sky. According to the Heavens Above website, there are three passes between now and Thursday evening that should be visible from Ottawa.
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Time for a bit of a rant about drivers on the Queensway. I haven’t grumbled about them (in my blog anyway) since March 11th of last year, so it’s probably time.

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While  out doing some snowshoeing and geocaching in Pine Grove forest this afternoon I looked back along the trail and saw this scene.

So, my flight from Ottawa to England was uneventful (generally, the best type of flight) and I was even able to sleep a bit. and we arrived about half an hour ahead of schedule. Clearing immigration and customs was the least painless experience I’ve ever had and I was basically standing on the sidewalk within five to ten minutes of joining the queue. Even the baggage retrieval was fast.

I called Rob on my cellphone and he gave me a “talk-in” to where he was parked and we were on our way.

According to all the route planning thingies, the trip from Heathrow Airport to Perth, Scotland takes 7 hours and 10 minutes. The most charitable way we can describe their accuracy, based on our experience, is with the phrase “they lie”.

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