APOD: Rocket Launch as Seen from the Space... (2018 Nov 26)

[APOD Robot]

Rocket Launch as Seen from the Space Station

Explanation: Have you ever seen a rocket launch -- from space? A close inspection of the featured time-lapse video will reveal a rocket rising to Earth orbit as seen from the International Space Station (ISS). The Russian Soyuz-FG rocket was launched ten days ago from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan, carrying a Progress MS-10 (also 71P) module to bring needed supplies to the ISS. Highlights in the 90-second video (condensing about 15-minutes) include city lights and clouds visible on the Earth on the lower left, blue and gold bands of atmospheric airglow running diagonally across the center, and distant stars on the upper right that set behind the Earth. A lower stage can be seen falling back to Earth as the robotic supply ship fires its thrusters and begins to close on the ISS, a space laboratory that is celebrating its 20th anniversary this month. Currently, three astronauts live aboard the Earth-orbiting ISS, and conduct, among more practical duties, numerous science experiments that expand human knowledge and enable future commercial industry in low Earth orbit.

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[sym666]

What is the intermittent red light on the earth surface visible from about 1:14?

[Ann]

Nice, and more interesting than I thought it would be.

I find it almost touching to see the tiny size of the intrepid spacecraft leaving the Earth. One tiny little speck of light is moving in a different direction than everything else. It looks like "the mouse that roared" or something like that. And yet, the tremendous gravitational pull of the Earth doesn't let go of its grip, and the little spacecraft can go no higher. Impressive, touching and sobering, all at once.

Does anyone recognize any of the stars, or can you spot any well-known asterisms?

[heehaw]

Fabulous! Truly wonderful!

[starsurfer]

My favourite part is the airglow, it reminds me of a planetary nebula.

[Osh]

Is that a meteorite just after 1:13?

[Chris Peterson]

Is that a meteorite just after 1:13?

That would be meteor, not meteorite. And no, I don't think so. This video is a timelapse, made up of a sequence of individual exposures, and that object seems to be in two frames. A meteor is usually too fast for that to happen- in a movie made this way, it should appear stationary and in a single frame. I'd guess that we're seeing another satellite. (A meteor is possible if this sequence was shot very fast, like quarter-second exposures one second apart. I didn't try to track down the timelapse details.)

[neufer]

Click to play embedded YouTube video.

Auroras frequently appear either as a diffuse glow or as "curtains" that extend approximately in the east–west direction. At some times, they form "quiet arcs"; at others, they evolve and change constantly. These are called "active aurora".

<<Red: At the highest altitudes, excited atomic oxygen emits at 630 nm (red); low concentration of atoms and lower sensitivity of eyes at this wavelength make this color visible only under more intense solar activity. The low number of oxygen atoms and their gradually diminishing concentration is responsible for the faint appearance of the top parts of the "curtains". Scarlet, crimson, and carmine are the most often-seen hues of red for the auroras.

Green: At lower altitudes, the more frequent collisions suppress the 630-nm (red) mode: rather the 557.7 nm emission (green) dominates. Fairly high concentration of atomic oxygen and higher eye sensitivity in green make green auroras the most common. The excited molecular nitrogen (atomic nitrogen being rare due to high stability of the N2 molecule) plays a role here, as it can transfer energy by collision to an oxygen atom, which then radiates it away at the green wavelength. (Red and green can also mix together to produce pink or yellow hues.) The rapid decrease of concentration of atomic oxygen below about 100 km is responsible for the abrupt-looking end of the lower edges of the curtains. Both the 557.7 and 630.0 nm wavelengths correspond to forbidden transitions of atomic oxygen, slow mechanism that is responsible for the graduality (0.7 s and 107 s respectively) of flaring and fading.>>

[NateWhilk]

Wonderful!

[De58te]

That was beautiful. I am surprised at my age that my 60-year-old eyesight could see that little spec of a rocket, and I think I could even see the faint wisps of its rocket exhaust. Just one quizzical observation, at the beginning judging by the direction of the Space Station it looked like the station passed directly over the rocket site. What would have happened if they had launched the rocket say 2 minutes earlier? Or whatever the mathematical calculation would be taking into account the speed of the rocket and the orbit of the Space Station, that the two would arrive at the same point and collide! "Oh oh boss." The flight director would say. "The rocket seems to have a perfect launch. Everything is going like clockwork." Then all of a sudden kaboom. "Did anybody else hear an earth shattering kaboom?"

[Chris Peterson]

That was beautiful. I am surprised at my age that my 60-year-old eyesight could see that little spec of a rocket, and I think I could even see the faint wisps of its rocket exhaust. Just one quizzical observation, at the beginning judging by the direction of the Space Station it looked like the station passed directly over the rocket site. What would have happened if they had launched the rocket say 2 minutes earlier? Or whatever the mathematical calculation would be taking into account the speed of the rocket and the orbit of the Space Station, that the two would arrive at the same point and collide!

The launch was designed precisely so the rocket does arrive at the same point as the ISS in order for the two to collide, with a minimum of expensive post launch course adjustments.

[alter-ego]

Is that a meteorite just after 1:13?

That would be meteor, not meteorite. And no, I don't think so. This video is a timelapse, made up of a sequence of individual exposures, and that object seems to be in two frames. A meteor is usually too fast for that to happen- in a movie made this way, it should appear stationary and in a single frame. I'd guess that we're seeing another satellite. (A meteor is possible if this sequence was shot very fast, like quarter-second exposures one second apart. I didn't try to track down the timelapse details.)

A meteor is likely.
This link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1S0CTtY ... e=youtu.be details the image sequence more. The time-lapsed frames are separated by 2/3 second (2050 frames in 22m 46s), and based on the trail length in the two frames, I'd estimate the exposure times to be about 0.15 seconds.

[neufer]

Just one quizzical observation, at the beginning judging by the direction of the Space Station it looked like the station passed directly over the rocket site. What would have happened if they had launched the rocket say 2 minutes earlier? Or whatever the mathematical calculation would be taking into account the speed of the rocket and the orbit of the Space Station, that the two would arrive at the same point and collide!

The launch was designed precisely so the rocket does arrive at the same point as the ISS in order for the two to collide, with a minimum of expensive post launch course adjustments.

collide (v.) "to strike together forcibly," 1620s, from Latin collidere "strike together," from assimilated form of com "with, together" + laedere "to strike, injure by striking," which is of unknown origin.

rendezvous (v.) 1640s, from rendezvous (n.) 1590s, "place for assembling of troops," from Middle French rendez-vous, noun use of rendez vous "present yourselves," from rendez, plural imperative of rendre "to present" + vous "you," from Latin vos.

[JohnD]

Wow! Seemed to go straight up, then separate from the launch vehicle, but that may be parallax, for the reasons given by Chris above. I expected it to curve over as it sped up to pursue the ISS into orbit.

Another point. Why are the background stars MORE visible through the atmosphere than through space above?
John

[Chris Peterson]

Wow! Seemed to go straight up, then separate from the launch vehicle, but that may be parallax, for the reasons given by Chris above. I expected it to curve over as it sped up to pursue the ISS into orbit.

The rocket is launched into the same inclination as the ISS (51.6°). From the perspective of the ISS, it looks like a line, because the curvature into orbit is the same as the plane of the ISS orbit. That is, the rocket is curving, it's just curving directly toward the ISS, so its projection is linear.

Another point. Why are the background stars MORE visible through the atmosphere than through space above?

Are they? That isn't obvious to me. I think there may be an illusion caused by the stars reappearing once they pass through the bright upper airglow.

[SpaceViking]

What is the intermittent red light on the earth surface visible from about 1:14?

Maybe the warning lights from one of those big wind turbine farms? They often all blink in unison and can illuminate the sky for a large area around them.

[Tragic Astronomy]

And with impossibilium for a payload
We lift the rocket
Out of the pocket
Nothing can stop it
We can only watch it

[wbd]

That's a truly awesome timelapse!

[DM2018]

How high is that visible layer of atmosphere?

[Chris Peterson]

How high is that visible layer of atmosphere?

The bright yellow band at the top is the sodium layer, which is about 100 km high.

[patrix]

Why is it CGI?

[Chris Peterson]

Why is it CGI?

It isn't.

[Thierry]

Apologies for replying to a fairly old post, but how did this timelapse achieve the level of dynamic range that it had? You could see the sun/moon(?) setting at around 50 seconds, and I found it suprising that the difference in brightness at different points of the timelapse didn't over/underexpose parts of it.