Tim Peak has returned to earth after spending 6 months on the International Space Station. The advantage of living in Lanzarote are the clear night skies and I have been lucky enough to see the ISS pass over on many different occasions. For a while I has a tracker on my phone to alert me when the ship was due to pass but then found I was spotting it radomly when out. It fascinates me and crosses the sky pretty quickly so you have to keep a keen eye open and know in which direction to look as this can change too.
Here are some interesting facts
1. It is bigger than a football field measuring 357 feet end to end
2. It travels 17,240 mph around the earth
4. It is the most expensive object ever built
5. It has been built in stages and was not inhabited at first. The first section was sent into space in 1998
6. It was first occupied in the year 2000
7. Modules have been sent up by the European community, USA, Russia and Japan
8. The space ship is 248 miles above the earth, but does fall due to the gravitational pull of the earth. Every so often rockets will boot the station back up to a higher orbit