Sunday Matinee – Aurora Borealis and North America at Night

[Video Credit: Image Science & Analysis Laboratory, NASA Johnson Space Center]

This video was taken by the crew of Expedition 29 on board the International Space Station. The sequence of shots was taken October 18, 2011 from 07:09:06 to 07:27:42 GMT[.]

This video compacts about 18-and-a-half minutes of ISS travel into about 30 seconds.

What I particularly enjoy about this video is that it starts looking directly to the area of the planet I occupy. Alaska’s Kenai Peninsula is easily distinguishable, especially due to the city lights of Kenai, Soldotna, Homer, and Seward. South of that you can see Kodiak Island. Immediately north of the Kenai Peninsula, Anchorage is brightly lit; Fairbanks can be seen even further to the north. The video travels east across the United States, as you find yourself struggling to decide on whether you should watch the aurora borealis (northern lights) to the north, or try to guess all of the cities you can see due to the concentrated man-made light. Clouds obscure much of the view between Alaska and the Rockies, but they break in time to offer great Canadian views of Calgary and Edmonton.

Following that, Minneapolis/St.Paul stand out, just before Chicago takes center-stage at around 24 seconds in, brilliantly lit, just south of Lake Michigan. You can catch the flashes of a lightning storm as we continue east towards the East Coast of the United States. You might notice how populated and electrified the East Coast is, compared to the Mid-West and the central United States. The video ends just after our view heads east over the coast of Florida, and above the shallow waters of the Bahamas.

Tags: Alaska, aurora borealis, Globe At Night, International Space Station, North America, time-lapse

This entry was posted on February 12, 2012 at 12:59 pm and is filed under Earth, Nightsky, Sunday Matinee. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.