THE INTERNATIONAL SPACE STATION—

This is a time exposure image of the ISS passing over Bellville Friday, October 5th at approximately 8:20 p.m. EDST. The station is about 250 miles above the Earth and is traveling at a speed of some 17,000 mph.

The image was done with a Canon Rebel 400 XTi digital single lens reflex camera and a 17 to 85 mm lens set at its widest viewing angle which is about the equivalent of a 28 mm lens on a 35 mm film camera.

Using the camera’s bulb function the exposure was 62 seconds at F 5.6 at an ISO of 400. Focus was set manually at infinity and I tripped the shutter when the station came into sight and closed the shutter when I was confident it had passed out of the camera’s field of view.

The station was reflecting the sun’s light at a very bright (-) 2.2 magnitude.

The brightest star just above and a bit left of center is Vega in the constellation Lyra. I could not see the star in the viewfinder so I aimed the camera manually knowing the station would track north of Vega on a southwest to northeast course. North is to the bottom of this image and east is to the right.

Remember, there are seven astronauts living and working on the station and it orbits the Earth 17 times each day.