It’s time for ISS passes again in the evening over SoCal.

Image from Heavens-Above.com

A partial pass, with the station fading into orbital sunset right overhead. Okay, let’s fight the traffic incoming to Burbank and take a look!

Oh, yeah! Click on that image to see it full sized! I love that big, heavy, wide angle, light bucket of a lens with the razor sharp focus!

So, I slightly misjudged where the bottom of the frame was, so we picked up some glare from our kitchen lights and the laundry room skylights. To get a rooftop-to-zenith angle for the camera it’s at a really awkward angle on the tripod. Good to know for next time.

The ISS was coming from the northwest, rising behind those Italian cypress trees and headed toward where the moon was up behind me and to the left.

Also visible are two airliners going into Burbank’s Runway 8. The lower bright diagonal line is Southwest flight #1555 coming in from Oakland, while the curving line on the right margin (with the red & green navigation lights showing as well) is JetBlue flight #359 coming in from JFK in New York City. (Images from FlightRadar 24.)

Did we catch the ISS fading into orbital sunset? Well…kinda? It’s really, really close, and if you look close at the final frame of the sequence you CAN see the trail fading as it moves from the bottom right to upper left.

If the camera had been positioned a smidge higher and the frame included less of the roof and more of the sky just above… Coulda, woulda, shoulda!

On the other hand, there is a hidden treat in this frame. Can you find it? The “coat hanger asterism” is in there if you click on that image and look at it full sized. It’s not bright, but it is clear if you know what to look for.

So, I told you all of that to tell you about this…

If you’re in SoCal tomorrow night and the sky’s clear, go out and look for an EVEN BETTER ISS PASS.

A little earlier, rising at 19:16 in the northwest, but with autumn here it should be plenty dark and the ISS will be REALLY bright. Again the ISS’s path will be almost straight overhead, and while it will fade to darkness in orbital sunset before it gets to the far horizon, it still covers most of the sky.

EVEN BETTER, SpaceX is supposed to launch the NASA Crew-5 mission tomorrow afternoon. They don’t dock at the ISS until the day after launch, so if they get off planet on time tomorrow you may be able to see the Crew Dragon following the ISS, trailing along on the same orbital track.

Take a chance to see it if you get a chance! Let me know if you see it, and wave to the crews, and let me know if you saw it!