ISS Sighting - Springdale, UT - Rancho Santa Margarita, CA - Site 2 - International Space Station Sightings on Waymarking.com

At 16:59:15 PST the ISS reached at an altitude of 86° over Rancho Santa Margarita, CA. At 18:11:24 MST the ISS reached at an altitude of 68° over Springdale, UT. Other observers were JJG10101 and Mark 1962 in the Orange County, CA area.

Springdale, UT is 349 miles from Rancho Santa Margarita, CA. The time the ISS took to travel the whole distance (excluding the 1 hr time change) was 12 minutes and 9 seconds.

The sky in Springdale was clear and the stars were just coming out. The sky in Rancho Santa Margarita had low clouds (the early start of a fog bank that night). The sky in other parts of Orange County, CA was partly cloudy.

According to the star charts for Springdale, the ISS was to travel past Cygnus and through Cepheus. At the time of the sighting very few stars could be seen, so it was difficult to get our sky bearings. About 2 minutes before the ISS was supposed to pass, we spotted a sattellite travelling through Cassiopea which we originally thought might be the ISS. It was faint and ended up travelling perpendicular to the ISS's trajectory. After taking the pictures of the first satellite and putting the camera away, we noticed the REAL ISS as bright as could be travelling the entire length of the sky. By this time, more stars were out and it was clearly brighter than any star or planet.

This entire experience was worth coordinating and planning for. It was special that we were able to see this on vacation in Zion National Park and it was especially neat that the Space Shuttle Endeavor was docked to the ISS during the pass.

Info on the Space Shuttle Endeavor's November 2008 Mission:
On November 14, NASA launched the 124th flight of the space shuttle for a delivery of supplies to the International Space Station. It landed on Novemeber 30 at Edwards AFB.

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