The International Space Station is visible flying over the UK

Over the next few weeks, the International Space Station can be easily seen flying over the UK. Its solar panels are the size of a football field, allowing the space station to be easily seen from the ground as they reflect plenty of sunlight.

Times when the space station can be seen for the next week are below, or at either SpaceWeather.com, or on Heavens-Above.com. Although these times are exact for Brighton, the times will be within half a minute of these times for anywhere in the UK, or you can simply follow those links and type in a new location.

The table below gives the time and position of the International Space Station as it starts to fly over the UK, reaches the maximum height and the time when it disappears (ends).

In the table, Alt. refers to the altitude of the space craft as it flies overhead (90° is directly overhead, and 0° is the horizon); Az. is the Azimuth, or direction, of where it will be at the given time (0° being North, 90°: is East, 180° is South and 270° is West).

Date	Starts			Max. height			Ends
	Time	Alt.	Az.	Time	Alt.	Az.	Time	Alt.	Az.
29 Apr	21:41:07	10	SSW	21:43:40	26	SSE	21:44:24	23	ESE
30 Apr	22:05:51	10	SW	22:08:45	53	SSE	22:09:58	29	E
1 May	20:56:20	10	SSW	20:58:54	27	SSE	21:01:30	10	E
1 May	22:30:59	10	WSW	22:33:57	89	SSE	22:34:54	40	ENE
2 May	21:21:03	10	WSW	21:23:57	55	SSE	21:26:52	10	E
2 May	22:56:14	10	W	22:59:12	73	N	22:59:26	67	NE
3 May	21:46:08	10	WSW	21:49:07	89	N	21:52:05	10	ENE
3 May	23:21:28	10	W	23:23:44	48	WNW	23:23:44	48	WNW
4 May	20:36:08	10	WSW	20:39:03	58	SSE	20:41:59	10	E
4 May	22:11:21	10	W	22:14:19	73	N	22:16:22	18	E
5 May	21:01:12	10	W	21:04:11	87	N	21:07:08	10	E
5 May	22:36:31	10	W	22:39:30	82	N	22:40:24	41	E
6 May	21:26:22	10	W	21:29:20	73	N	21:32:17	10	E
6 May	23:01:39	10	WNW	23:04:22	61	SW	23:04:22	61	SW

Mercury disappearing into twilight

Mercury orbits the Sun in just 88 days, and over the next week, you can see how quickly it moves in relation to Venus.

I took the photograph to the left on Monday the 12th April, at about 9pm, and you can see Mercury and Venus side by side (Venus is the bright object; Mercury the fainter object to the right of the image just slightly lower then Venus in the evening sky). But over the next week, as Mercury orbits around the Sun, it will rapidly move away from Venus to be in line with the Sun on the 28th of April.

So, if you want to see Mercury for yourself, the next few days would be a good time to look...

Mercury & Venus in the evening sky

The next few weeks are an ideal time to see Mercury & Venus together in the evening sky.

Mercury is always a difficult planet to find. It is the closest planet to the Sun, and so it always remains close to the Sun in the sky, usually totally hidden in the Sun's glare. But at the beginning of April (as the simulation below shows), Mercury gets to its Greatest Eastern Elongation, meaning that it is as far away eastwards of the Sun as it is ever going to get, and so it is the best time to see Mercury in the evening sky.

So wait for the Sun to set, and then go out and see if you can see Mercury for yourself! The best days to look are the 15th and 16th of April, when the Moon acts as a useful guide. This will be your best chance to see the elusive Mercury!

Each frame in the simulation above is a view looking west when the Sun is 6 degrees below the horizon (about 40 minutes after sunset) - that's dark enough to see Venus and Mercury, but not so late that they are hidden behind trees. The simulation was done using Stellarium.