I don't know about you, but I grew up in the 60's and I was always mesmerized by the space program. That fascination is still alive today. I will occasionally find areas on the Internet that help to meet the need I have to play astronaut. (While sitting in my recliner of course!) Here are a few of those sites that I have found.
Let's go to the the Human Space Flight-Orbital Tracker first. This site shows the current location of the International Space Station. This page takes a few moments to load depending upon your connection and traffic to the site, so please be patient. NASA has some other RealTime Satellite Tracking opportunities that are great and will literally keep you busy all day long.
Another site I enjoy is Heavens Above. Before you journey to Heavens Above understand that you must register and create a New User Account. This allows the user to personalize the viewing experience. And when I say viewing experience I mean it literally. By providing your Latitude and Longitude in the Personal Configuration page you will be able to determine when various satellites may be orbiting above your location. And yes, you might just be able to see one of them on a clear night. Heavens Above will also provide astronomical data and views of various heavenly bodies.
For those of you who may not know your Latitude and Longitude or may not know how to determine it here are a few links for you to visit: Northern Arizona University, Free ZIP Code Lookup at ZIPInfo (Simply check the "latitude and longitude" box and enter your ZIP Code, click "GO" and viola, there you have it.), or try iTouchMap (They use a Google Maps interface so it is quite easy, just touch and click a spot on the map. Remember to adjust the zoom in order to get a better look.)
Not really a satellite tracker but still fun none-the-less is The University of Colorado-Boulder site, Physics 2000. Within this site (I can't really find it in the Table of Contents though.) is a satellite applet. Once the applet page loads you will see a square in the upper left hand corner of your screen. In this square is the earth with the moon orbiting around it. Put your cursor some where in the square and left click. This releases a make believe satellite and you can see how it interacts with the gravitational pull of the earth and moon as they orbit. Push several times and you now have several little satellites. FUN, FUN, FUN.
For more Fun Stuff check out my Fun Stuff links at del.icio.us.
© 2008 Barry T Horst
