Category Archives: Space Station

PETER HOLLEY

Last updated12:05, July 27 2017

GOOGLE MAPS

Peek inside the cramped, chaotic and dizzying homes of humans not anchored to Earth.

You've used Google Street View to check out a new apartment, map traffic before you hit the road and search for haunting slices of the everyday world.

Now, the comprehensive terrestrial mapping system has gone Extra-Terrestrial, allowing users to peer inside the International Space Station (ISS) from their computerwith 360-degree, panoramic views.

The Street View imagery was captured by Thomas Pesquet, an astronaut with the European Space Agency, who spent six months aboard the ISS before returning to Earth in June.

Google Street View, which is featured in Google Maps and Google World, was launched in 2007 and quickly expanded locations around the globe, including places as remote as Mt. Everest base camp and as offbeat as Loch Ness.

READ MORE: *Astronaut captures stunning pictures of New Zealand *Kiwi daredevil takes Google Street View inside seething Vanuatu volcano *Group of Kiwis immortalised on Google Street View in Italy

The vast majority of Street View's photography is shot by a vehicle, whose movement is available to fans online.

THOMAS PESQUET

Thomas Pesquet captured the images for Google Street View on board the International Space Station.

Google's foray into space is the first time Street View imagery was captured beyond planet Earth.

In a blog post about his experience, Pesquet wrote that "it was difficult to find the words or take a picture that accurately describes the feeling of being in space."

"Working with Google on my latest mission, I captured Street View imagery to show what the ISS looks like from the inside, and share what it's like to look down on Earth from space," he added.

GOOGLE MAPS

What a view: Looking back at Earth.

The virtual tour allows users to peek into areas where astronauts eat, exercise, work and even bathe.

Pesquet's imagery reveal an environment that may look a bit cramped and chaotic - if not altogether dizzying - to humans anchored on Earth, but some of the scenes from side the ISS are downright mesmerising.

GOOGLE MAPS

A street view image from the Joint Airlock, an area contains space suits also known as Extravehicular Mobility Units. They provide crew members with life support that enables extravehicular activity.

The images were captured using DSLR cameras and then "stitched together" back on Earth to create panoramic views.

Pesquet noted that the ISS is a "busy place" with six crew members working and researching 12 hours a day.

"There are a lot of obstacles up there, and we had limited time to capture the imagery, so we had to be confident that our approach would work. Oh, and there's that whole zero gravity thing," he wrote.

Floating through the ISS online you'll notice clickable dots with detailed descriptions of the space and it's objects to help viewers understand what exactly they're looking at.

Pesquet noted that this is the first time annotations -"helpful little notes that pop up as you explore the ISS" - have been added to Street View imagery.

The ISS is a "large spacecraft" that orbits around Earth at more than 28,163kmhand is home for astronauts from countries around the world, according to Nasa.

The ISS is made up of many pieces that were constructed by astronauts beginning in 1998. By 2000, as more pieces of the station were added, the station was ready for people, according to Nasa. Portions of the station are connected via modules known as "nodes," according to Nasa.

"The first crew arrived on November 2, 2000," Nasareports. "People have lived on the space station ever since. Over time more pieces have been added. Nasaand its partners around the world finished the space station in 2011."

NASA compares the inside of the station to the inside of a house, noting that the structure -- which weighs almost one million pounds and covers an area the side of a football field -- has five bedrooms, two bathrooms, a gymnasium and a big bay window.

The station houses labs from the United States, Russia, Japan and Europe.

"We can collect data on the Earth's oceans, atmosphere and land surface," Pesquet wrote. "We can conduct experiments and studies that we wouldn't be able to do from Earth, like monitoring how the human body reacts to microgravity, solving mysteries of the immune system, studying cyclones in order to alert populations and governments when a storm is approaching, or monitoring marine litter -- the rapidly increasing amount waste found in our oceans."

Several times a week, Mission Control at NASA's Johnson Space Center in Houston, Texas, determines where earthlings can spot the station from the ground below from thousands of locations all over the globe.

-The Washington Post

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Google Street View's latest destination: the International Space Station - Stuff.co.nz

Street View worked with Nasa to design a gravity-free method of collecting imagery using DSLR cameras and equipment already on the ISS.

From the Amazon rainforest to Antarctica, Googles interactive 360-degree panoramic Street View technology has taken users to some pretty remote places on planet Earth but this marks the first time it takes us on a journey of exploration outside Earth. Google worked with the European Space Agency (ESA) and Nasa to map out the 15 interconnected modules that make up the International Space Station (ISS) complete with a new feature annotations to help virtual explorers get to know the various locations and components within ISS.

Because of the particular constraints of living and working in space, it wasnt possible to collect Street View using Googles usual methods, explained Thomas Pesquet, an ESA astronaut who worked on the project.

Instead, the Street View team worked with Nasa at the Johnson Space Centre in Houston, Texas, and Marshall Space Flight Centre in Huntsville, Alabama, to design a gravity-free method of collecting the imagery using DSLR cameras and equipment already on the ISS.

Pesquet himself took many still images around the space station, which were then transmitted back to Earth and stitched together to create the resulting 360-degree panoramic imagery that gives us a glimpse into life on board ISS.

google.com/streetview/#international-space-station/cupola-observational-module

Excerpt from:
Google Street View docks with International Space Station - Irish Times

Aspiring astronauts can now pretend to float on the International Space Station (ISS), thanks to Google. The company worked with astronauts on the orbiting complex to provide a Google Street View of the space station, from its science labs to its beautiful Earth-facing Cupola window.

Thomas Pesquet, a European Space Agency astronaut who helped collect the images earlier this year, said in a blog post that the experience of capturing the tour "describes the feeling of being in space" better than words or a picture can. But there were limitations to collecting the data. For one, astronauts float in space, so the imagery of the ISS couldn't be captured the same way as other Google Street View locations.

NASA's Johnson Space Center in Houston and Marshall Space Flight Center in Alabama worked with Google to create a "gravity-free method of collecting the imagery," Pesquet said in the blog post. These methods included using DSLR cameras and other equipment already available at the space station. An extended video provides an additional look at how the view came together. (Pesquet didn't specify the other equipment in the blog post.) [The International Space Station: Inside and Out (Infographic)]

"I collected still photos in space, that were sent down to Earth where they were stitched together to create panoramic 360 degree imagery of the ISS," Pesquet wrote.

"We did a lot of troubleshooting before collecting the final imagery that you see today in Street View," he added.

"The ISS has technical equipment on all surfaces, with lots of cables and a complicated layout with modules shooting off in all directions left, right, up, down," Pesquet wrote. "And it's a busy place, with six crew members [at the time] carrying out research and maintenance activities 12 hours a day. There are a lot of obstacles up there, and we had limited time to capture the imagery, so we had to be confident that our approach would work."

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You Can Now Explore the International Space Station With Google Street View - Seeker

Stargazers will be in for a treat as they will be able to glimpse the International Space Station in the night sky.

People in Hull will be able to see the incredible space station from this week, with bright passes by the station visible in the UK until August 9.

The best part is you wont even need any special equipment to see it overhead amongst the stars.

The ISS is the biggest space station and laboratory ever built, which means that at certain times it can even be visible with the naked eye.

Space enthusiasts will be able to easily spot the station as it orbits the Earth travelling at 175,00mph at an altitude of roughly 200 miles.

People should be able to see the station on numerous occasions this week.

These are brightest overhead passes by the station although passes will be fainter by August 9.

Passes will take place at the following dates and times:

There may also be other objects visible in the sky too while you are watching, like Perseid Meteors or satellites.

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The International Space Station will always start passing from a westerly direction so keep your eyes peeled for it gliding across the sky.

Sometimes a pass can last as long as five minutes, but it looks like a bright, fast-moving star so be careful not to mistake it for a passing aircraft.

It takes 90 minutes to orbit so you may be able to catch it passing more than once if you dont mind spending a couple of hours outside at night.

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How to see the International Space Station over Hull this week - Hull Daily Mail

Flight engineer Kate Rubins checks out the Bigelow Expandable Activity Module, which is attached to the International Space Station. NASA hide caption

Flight engineer Kate Rubins checks out the Bigelow Expandable Activity Module, which is attached to the International Space Station.

A prototype of what could be the next generation of space stations is currently in orbit around the Earth.

The prototype is unusual. Instead of arriving in space fully assembled, it was folded up and then expanded to its full size once in orbit.

The module is called BEAM, the Bigelow Expandable Activity Module, and it has been attached to the International Space Station since April last year.

Expandable modules allow NASA to pack a large volume into a smaller space for launch. They're not made of metal, but instead use tough materials like the Kevlar found in bulletproof vests.

The station crew used air pressure to unfold and expand the BEAM, but it's wrong to think about BEAM as expanding like a balloon that could go "pop" if something punctured it.

NASA's Jason Crusan says there is a better analogy: "It's much like the tire of your car."

Even with no air in it, a tire retains its tirelike shape.

When BEAM unfolded in orbit, it adopted its more natural shape, something resembling a stumpy watermelon. Even if it was to lose all its internal air, "it still has structure to it," says Crusan.

Of course NASA would prefer BEAM not lose all its air, so there are many layers of shielding to prevent things like meteorites or other space debris from poking a hole in BEAM.

"We do believe we've taken at least one hit," says Crusan. "Very small in nature, and actually we can't even visually see where it's at."

Crusan says there was no loss of pressure from the hit.

NASA isn't actually using BEAM for anything. It's there just to see how it behaves in space. But Crusan says the space station crew does go inside every once in a while to check sensors inside the module. He says crew members seem to like visiting BEAM.

Astronauts Peggy Whitson and Thomas Pesquet are photographed inside BEAM, which has an interior roughly the size of a medium school bus. NASA hide caption

Astronauts Peggy Whitson and Thomas Pesquet are photographed inside BEAM, which has an interior roughly the size of a medium school bus.

"We've actually had up to six crew members at a time inside of it. It's about 15 to 16 cubic meters inside," says Crusan. That translates to something like the interior space of a modest-sized school bus.

The original plan was to detach BEAM after two years and let it burn up as it re-enters Earth's atmosphere. But there has been a change.

"Because of its performance and it's doing extremely well, there's really no reason to throw it away," says Crusan.

Since storage is at a premium aboard the space station, NASA now plans to use BEAM as a kind of storage shed and to keep it in space as long as the station continues to operate.

The company that made BEAM, Bigelow Aerospace, has big plans for expandable modules, including a stand-alone space station called the B330. The B330 will be 20 times larger than BEAM. But company president Robert Bigelow remains cautious despite the good performance of BEAM.

"No, I worry too much," says Bigelow. The B330 is much, much more complex than BEAM.

"It has two propulsion systems," he says. "It has very large solar arrays, a full suite of environmental life-support systems."

These are all things that have to work flawlessly in order to keep a crew alive and happy in space.

"That's why I walk around perpetually with a frown. It's just because there's so much to think about and be concerned about," says Bigelow.

Despite his concerns, Bigelow says his new space stations may be in orbit before too long. His company plans to have two B330s ready for launch in 2020.

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After A Year In Space, The Air Hasn't Gone Out Of NASA's Inflated Module - NPR

Forget views of side streets and poorly parked cars why not explore the International Space Station (ISS) instead? Earlier this week Google Maps released its first-ever Street View in space, and now, Earthlings can virtually navigate through astronauts home away from home. Because no one could drive a van and camera around the ISS, Thomas Pesquet, a European Space Agency astronaut, collaborated with NASA and Google to take images with DSLR cameras already aboard the craft. The tunnel-like interior is filled with wall-to-wall cables and equipment, so navigation is trickier than on Earth. But a scattering of helpful tags identify locations and equipment that people unfamiliar with astronaut life might not recognize. Yours truly ended up in a bathroom on one of her first navigational clicks, but maybe you will have better luck.

If the blurbs of information only increase your curiosity about daily life on the ISS, NASA astronaut Suni Williams explains all about sleeping, eating and manipulating that strange toilet in this video from 2014, below. Pair her explanations with the immersive Street View and maybe you will feel like an astronaut yourself.

Continued here:
Ground Control to Major Google: Space Station Street View Is Here - Scientific American

Wednesday evening should be the best time of the week for getting a look at the International Space Station over Richmond.

The station should be visible starting at 8:56 p.m. as a bright dot above the west-southwest horizon, between Jupiter and the setting crescent moon. It will peak three minutes later as it crosses through the Ursa Major constellation, or Big Dipper, and set in the northeast sky by 9:02 p.m.

Though the sky may feature a few clouds, it ought to be clear enough to catch the bright reflection of the sun by then, slightly below our horizon off the stations solar panels.

There are a few other opportunities to spot the station this week, but this one will be the highest and brightest for our area until the middle of August.

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Wednesday evening is a good opportunity to watch the International Space Station over Richmond - Richmond.com

SmartNews Keeping you current Looking out at Earth from the Cupola Observation Module of the International Space Station on Google Street View (Google / YouTube)

smithsonian.com July 24, 2017

Google Street View has taken armchair explorers to some of Earth's most exotic locations, fromthe ancient ruins ofAngkorandMachuPicchuto the natural wonders of theGalapagos Islandsand theGrand Canyon.But its newest location is (literally) out of this world: the International Space Station. AsThuyOngreports forThe Verge,you can now explore the ISS from your own computer screen without suffering the challengesof spaceflight.

"In the six months that I spent on the International Space Station, it was difficult to find the words or take a picture that accurately describes the feeling of being in space," French astronaut Thomas Pesquet writes in a blog postannouncing the new Street View location. "Working with Google on my latest mission, I captured Street View imagery to show what the ISS looks like from the inside, and share what its like to look down on Earth from outer space."

According to Pesquet, the team couldn't usethe bulky backpacks or car-mounted devices usually used to record Google Street View locations. Not only is it difficultto send new equipment to the station,it's a pretty cramped environment. And then there's the issue of microgravity.

"All of our Street View procedures are predicated on the existence of gravity," Stafford Marquardt jokes in a video about the new Street View. Tripods would have to be secured wherever they were positioned. And photos taken by hand run into the issue that the photographer is constantly floating. So the team had to get creative.

The basic idea is that the astronaut would take images of the space station using a DSLR camera already on theISS. Then the images would be stitched back together on Earth. The problem is thateach image must be taken at a similar angle before being stitched, otherwise there would be seams or distortion in the final picture where the images didn't quite line up.

After testing out various methods on Earth, they decided thatPesquetwould stretch two bungee cords in a cross section of the station. Then he would take images, rotating the camera around the center point where the bungee cords cross.

This isn't the first time non-traditional equipment has been used to add to the considerable library of Google Street View. An islander on Denmark'sFaroeIslands used 360-degree camerasstrapped to sheepto map the rocky archipelago, while divers in Australia recorded the Great Barrier Reefwith an underwater camera submarine.

Pesquethopes that being able to explore this collaborative project orbiting thousands of miles above our planet and all of its borders will help people get perspective on the Earth.

"None of this would have been possible without the work of the team on the ground, my colleagues (turned roommates) on theISS, and the countries that came together to send us up to space,"Pesquetwrote in his blog post. "Looking at Earth from above made me think about my own world a little differently, and I hope that theISSon Street View changes your view of the world too."

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Continued here:
Explore the International Space Station Using Google Street View - Smithsonian

Aspiring astronauts can now pretend to float on the International Space Station (ISS), thanks to Google. The company worked with astronauts on the orbiting complex to provide a Google Street View of the space station, from its science labs to its beautiful Earth-facing Cupola window.

Thomas Pesquet, a European Space Agency astronaut who helped collect the images earlier this year, said in a blog post that the experience of capturing the tour "describes the feeling of being in space" better than words or a picture can. But there were limitations to collecting the data. For one, astronauts float in space, so the imagery of the ISS couldn't be captured the same way as other Google Street View locations.

NASA's Johnson Space Center in Houston and Marshall Space Flight Center in Alabama worked with Google to create a "gravity-free method of collecting the imagery," Pesquet said in the blog post. These methods included using DSLR cameras and other equipment already available at the space station. An extended video provides an additional look at how the view came together. (Pesquet didn't specify the other equipment in the blog post.) [The International Space Station: Inside and Out (Infographic)]

"I collected still photos in space, that were sent down to Earth where they were stitched together to create panoramic 360 degree imagery of the ISS," Pesquet wrote.

"We did a lot of troubleshooting before collecting the final imagery that you see today in Street View," he added.

"The ISS has technical equipment on all surfaces, with lots of cables and a complicated layout with modules shooting off in all directions left, right, up, down," Pesquet wrote. "And it's a busy place, with six crew members [at the time] carrying out research and maintenance activities 12 hours a day. There are a lot of obstacles up there, and we had limited time to capture the imagery, so we had to be confident that our approach would work."

The International Space Station's U.S. laboratory module as seen through Google Street View.

The tour is the first Google Street View captured in space, and it features annotations that pop up to explain additional information about each module, such as how astronauts stay physically fit or the kinds of food they eat.

You can read the entire blog post here: https://www.blog.google/products/maps/welcome-outer-space-view/ and take a virtual tour of the International Space Station here in Google Street View: https://www.google.com/streetview/#international-space-station/

The International Space Station's Cupola observation module as seen through Google Street View.

The ISS has been occupied continuously since November 2000. It generally houses three to six crewmembers, who split their days between science and maintenance activities. Crewmembers currently "commute" to space on the Russian Soyuz spacecraft, but within the next few years, commercial spacecraft from SpaceX and Boeing will ferry astronauts from U.S. soil for the first time since the space shuttle's retirement in 2011.

Follow us @Spacedotcom, Facebook and Google+. Original article on Space.com.

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Explore the International Space Station with Google Street View - Space.com

Youve used Google Street View to check out a new apartment, map traffic before you hit the road and search for haunting slices of the everyday world.

Now, the comprehensive terrestrial mapping system has gone extra-terrestrial, allowing users to peer inside the International Space Station from their computer 248 miles below with 360-degree, panoramic views.

The Street View imagery was captured by Thomas Pesquet, an astronaut with the European Space Agency, who spent six months aboard the ISS before returning to Earth in June.

Google Street View, which is featured in Google Maps and Google World, was launched in 2007 and quickly expanded locations around the globe, including places as remote as Mt. Everest base camp and as offbeat as Loch Ness. The vast majority of Street Views photography is shot by a vehicle, whose movement is available to fans online.

Googles foray into space is the first time Street View imagery was captured beyond planet Earth.

In a blog post about his experience, Pesquet wrote that it was difficult to find the words or take a picture that accurately describes the feeling of being in space.

Working with Google on my latest mission, I captured Street View imagery to show what the ISS looks like from the inside, and share what its like to look down on Earth from space, he added.

The virtual tour allows users to peek into areas where astronauts eat, exercise, work and even bathe.

Pesquets imagery reveal an environment that may look a bit cramped and chaotic if not altogether dizzying to humans anchored on Earth, but some of the scenes from inside the ISS are downright mesmerizing.

The images were captured using DSLR cameras and then stitched together back on Earth to create panoramic views.

Pesquet noted that the ISS is a busy place with six crew members working and researching 12 hours a day.

There are a lot of obstacles up there, and we had limited time to capture the imagery, so we had to be confident that our approach would work. Oh, and theres that whole zero gravity thing, he wrote.

Floating through the ISS online youll notice clickable dots with detailed descriptions of the space and its objects to help viewers understand what exactly theyre looking at. Pesquet noted that this is the first time annotations helpful little notes that pop up as you explore the ISS have been added to Street View imagery.

The ISS is a large spacecraft that orbits around Earth at more than 17,500 mph and is home for astronauts from countries around the world, according to NASA. The ISS is made up of many pieces that were constructed by astronauts beginning in 1998. By 2000, as more pieces of the station were added, the station was ready for people, according to NASA. Portions of the station are connected via modules known as nodes, according to NASA.

The first crew arrived on November 2, 2000, NASA reports. People have lived on the space station ever since. Over time more pieces have been added. NASA and its partners around the world finished the space station in 2011.

NASA compares the inside of the station to the inside of a house, noting that the structure which weighs almost one million pounds and covers an area the side of a football field has five bedrooms, two bathrooms, a gymnasium and a big bay window.

The station houses labs from the United States, Russia, Japan and Europe.

We can collect data on the Earths oceans, atmosphere and land surface, Pesquet wrote. We can conduct experiments and studies that we wouldnt be able to do from Earth, like monitoring how the human body reacts to microgravity, solving mysteries of the immune system, studying cyclones in order to alert populations and governments when a storm is approaching, or monitoring marine litter the rapidly increasing amount waste found in our oceans.

Several times a week, Mission Control at NASAs Johnson Space Center in Houston, Texas, determines where earthlings can spot the station from the ground below from thousands of locations all over the globe. To find out the best time to see the station from your town, go tohttps://spotthestation.nasa.gov.

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Watertown Daily Times | Google Street View's latest destination: the ... - WatertownDailyTimes.com