A YouTube channel dedicated to aviation has recreated what it would be like to see the International Space Station flying low to the groundwhile flying to 27,600 km/h. Do you have good eyesight?
The International Space Station (ISS) is about 109 x 73 meters. It has been increasing little by little, as more modules have been added. But basically it’s as big as a football field.
Currently the ISS orbits a height of 400 kilometersthat is, some 400,000 meters. That is four times higher than the limit of space reached by the Blue Origin ship when it carried Jeff Bezos, the founder of Amazon, or William Shatner, the mythical Captain Kirk.
It moves at the incredible speed of 27,600 km/h. This allows you to give around the world in solo 93 minutes. Complete 15.5 Earth orbits in a single day. For astronauts traveling on the station, day and night don’t make much sense.
The International Space Station, at ground level
The Airplane Mode YouTube channel is dedicated, as its name suggests, to all aspects of aviation. It has from educational to historical videos, or recreations created with the flight simulator Microsoft Flight Simulator.
Using the simulator, the most graphically advanced that exists commercially, he has recreated the flight of the International Space Station with its actual size and speed, 27,600 km/hbut instead of orbiting at 400,000 meters, it does so at 3,000 metersthe usual height of an airplane.
Watch blow up a soccer field at 3,000 meters high That would be pretty spectacular, but imagine if it’s moving at 17,000 mph. At that speed, what is said to be seen, you will see very little. Check it out in this spectacular video:
As can be seen, despite its immense size we could hardly see the ISS, due to the enormous speed at which it moves.
We would only see a small flash furrowing over our heads. 27,600 km/h equals 7,666 meters per second. That is, it advances almost 8 kilometers per second. Only if you are in an elevated area on a large esplanade, you could see it for more than a second.
In the final part of the video you can also see what the Earth’s surface would look like from 3,000 meters high, at that speed.
Watch fly the International Space Station low to the grounda 27,600 km/h, it is impossible. The ISS It takes advantage of Earth’s inertia and gravity to move so fast. It is as if it were falling indefinitely. At such a small height, he would end up crashing from the weight. The atmosphere would also destroy it. But it is what one has simulation: that allows us to change the rules.