'Star' Track

November 24, 2018 1:24 AM

Timelapse of a rocket launch as seen from space - Progress MS 10 on 2018-11-16 (SLYT; h/t HN)
posted by Gyan (22 comments total)

Take THAT, Flat Earthers!


Seriously, this is beautiful.
posted by darkstar at 1:58 AM on November 24, 2018 [3 favorites]

Take THAT, Flat Earthers!
Ha! That was my thought too!
posted by Thella at 2:12 AM on November 24, 2018 [2 favorites]

I'm off to visit the Space Shuttle Discovery this morning, then do a 10-12 drive, and this really makes my morning.
posted by Brandon Blatcher at 4:08 AM on November 24, 2018 [3 favorites]

Slipping the surly bonds of earth indeed!
Did anyone else expect a popping sound as it burst through the atmosphere?
posted by RandomInconsistencies at 4:10 AM on November 24, 2018 [1 favorite]

It's a sight I'd imagined so many times growing up - blossoms of space vehicles bustling about a benevolent blue goddess, radiating opportunity and hope.

Then I got very sad upon realizing they'll be full of the titans climbing on the heads of every other human to sneak away into the emptiness.

Then I remembered they'll probably perish in never-before seen ways as we discover all the terribleness awaiting on the wrong side of a magnetosphere.

Still, sad that in this timeline almost nobody will bodily experience that view.

Regardless, thanks for the trip.
posted by abulafa at 5:43 AM on November 24, 2018

Flat Earthers

they are immune; they have been given various ways to explain it away: the video is fake, you can see in the video that there is no curvature, you can see a curvature but it is a camera trick, etc.
posted by thelonius at 5:47 AM on November 24, 2018 [1 favorite]

I've played X-Box games with better CG. Pfft
posted by seanmpuckett at 6:07 AM on November 24, 2018

That was gorgeous!
posted by Thorzdad at 6:18 AM on November 24, 2018 [1 favorite]

You Earthlings are so adorable with your chemical propulsion and what not.
posted by RobotVoodooPower at 6:35 AM on November 24, 2018 [2 favorites]

Stunning. Thanks so much for posting.
posted by theora55 at 7:12 AM on November 24, 2018

How cool was that!?

What jumped out at me was that it's almost EXACTLY the same as a shot (at 6:30) in this cute animated short called One Small Step
posted by bonobothegreat at 8:31 AM on November 24, 2018

I could watch this all day long. Seriously, someone make this into a screensaver.
posted by johnxlibris at 9:36 AM on November 24, 2018 [1 favorite]

Does it surprise anyone else that it seems like you can see more stars through the atmosphere than above it?
posted by OHenryPacey at 3:25 PM on November 24, 2018

Looking at the ISS groundtrack for that time, some of the cities that go by include Moscow (top right at 0:00), Irkutsk, Ulaanbaatar, Harbin, Vladivostok, and finally the Hakodate/Aomori area of northern Japan (where you can even see the synchronized flashing red lights of a wind farm).

All just human settlements from this perspective ...
posted by Dimpy at 4:27 PM on November 24, 2018 [1 favorite]

Does it surprise anyone else that it seems like you can see more stars through the atmosphere than above it?

Your mind is playing tricks on you. The atmosphere interferes with light coming into it, so a vacuum is preferable for visibility, which is why we put telescopes in space. There might be a lensing effect that affects the relative density versus a vacuum, but stars aren't going to be more visible with an atmosphere in the way.
posted by axiom at 9:31 PM on November 24, 2018

Doesn't the atmosphere spread the star light out though, so they appear fuzzier but larger? I thought that's why they 'twinkle'.
posted by ver at 11:07 PM on November 24, 2018

I think the higher star count in the atmosphere is caused by compression for streaming and/or some “cleaning” of the image by your viewing device. The fainter pin-point stars are being zeroed out as noise in the perfectly black background and then picked out against the atmosphere, where it's variable and lighter.
posted by bonobothegreat at 2:20 AM on November 25, 2018

...by ”lighter”, I meant less contrast.
posted by bonobothegreat at 2:27 AM on November 25, 2018

Absolutely beautiful and the amount of SCIENCE that went into making that happen gives me some hope for humanity.
posted by photoslob at 6:49 AM on November 25, 2018

I'm not at home, but I feel the need to play this on my TV on loop.
posted by ArgentCorvid at 7:50 AM on November 25, 2018

Incredible. And thank you Dimpy, I was scratching my head trying to figure out which coastline I was looking at. It doesn't help that north is to the right of the image (I think?).
posted by Acey at 11:11 AM on November 25, 2018 [1 favorite]

FYI, was pretty fantastic visiting the Space Shuttle Discovery. You never quite get how large it is until you're standing under it and looking at the heat shield tiles. The various discolorations all over it, from the wear and tear of spending nearly a year in space (cumulatively) speaks volumes also.

Highly recommended you go visit!
posted by Brandon Blatcher at 1:27 PM on November 26, 2018