Speaker 1: Welcome to Brainstuff from house Stuff Works dot com where
Speaker 1: smart Happens. Hi Am Marshall Brain with today's question, is
Speaker 1: there any way to see satellites that are in orbit?
Speaker 1: If you are a neighbor has a satellite dish sitting
Speaker 1: in the yard to pick up television signals, then you
Speaker 1: know where at least one orbiting satellite is located. The
Speaker 1: dish is pointed right at it. TV satellites unfortunately live
Speaker 1: in geosecretous orbits approximately twenty two thousand miles away, so
Speaker 1: it's impossible to see them unless you have a really
Speaker 1: big telescope. However, there are lots of satellites that pass
Speaker 1: overhead in a syncretous orbits, and there are only two
Speaker 1: hundred or three hundred miles away. If you live in
Speaker 1: a place that has a very clear sky where for example,
Speaker 1: you can see the Milky Way at night, simply lie
Speaker 1: on your back on a moonless night and look carefully.
Speaker 1: Occasionally you'll see something that looks like a star, but
Speaker 1: it's moving. That's a satellite. This technique works especially well
Speaker 1: on a boat in the Caribbean close to the equator.
Speaker 1: The International Space Station is so large that it's extremely
Speaker 1: easy to see. You just need to know when to look.
Speaker 1: There are many satellite tracking sites on the web that
Speaker 1: will tell you when and where to look. Jump into
Speaker 1: Google and you can find them. Do you have any
Speaker 1: ideas or suggestions for this podcast? If so, please send
Speaker 1: me an email at podcast at how stuff works dot com.
Speaker 1: For more on this and thousands of other topics, go
Speaker 1: to how stuff works dot com and be sure to
Speaker 1: check out the brain stuff blog on the how stuff
Speaker 1: works dot com home page.