Saturday 14 February 2015

ATV-5 'Georges Lemaitre' and the ISS chasing each other in a partly cloudy sky

ESA's ATV-5 'Georges Lemaitre' cargoship undocked from the ISS in the afternoon of February 14, 2015. A few hours later they made a fine zenith pass over Leiden, stille relatively close together, chasing each other in the sky.

Unfortunately, an untimely fields of clouds passed through the sky as the pass commenced. Still, the duo was well visible amidst the clouds. ATV-5 was an easy naked eye object at mag. +1. It was some 25 degrees (25-30 seconds) in front of the ISS.

ATV-5 near Capella

The image above shows ATV-5 amidst clouds near Capella. The image below shows both the ISS (top) and ATV-5 (bottom) descending to the east in a partly clouded sky. Both images were made with an EF2.0/35 mm lens.

ISS (top) and ATV-5 (bottom)

Frustatingly enough, the clouds disappeared and it was completely clear just 5 minutes after the pass....

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