Here’s a livestream video you may want to check in on from time to time. As Space.com describes, it’s from the ISS:
Cameras are officially rolling! Or, in this case, streaming.
SpaceTV-1, a set of Ultra High Definition 4k cameras from space streaming company Sen, was delivered to the International Space Station (ISS) last year, and is now broadcasting live views of Earth and space for all the world to see.
The London-based company is pursuing a mission to provide anyone and everyone with easy access to an experience usually reserved for astronauts — the overview effect. A phenomenon coined for the awe of seeing our planet from space and the effect it has on a person’s perception of humanity, Apollo 14‘s lunar module pilot NASA astronaut Ed Mitchell described the overview effect as, “an instant global consciousness,” accompanied with “an intense dissatisfaction with the state of the world and a compulsion to do something about it,” and Sen wants that for everybody.
. . . The SpaceTV-1 camera suite was delivered to the ISS in March, 2024, aboard a SpaceX Dragon spacecraft on the CRS-30 cargo mission last year. SpaceTV-1 was attached to the Bartolomeo platform on the European Space Agency’s (ESA) Columbus module. The package includes three cameras, providing three unique views of space around the ISS and Earth below.
A wide angle lens captures the long curve of Earth’s horizon, with the occasional piece of the space station moving in and out of frame. A tighter view focuses directly on Earth, showing a stretch about 150 miles x 110 miles (240 kilometers x 180 kilometers). The third camera looks at the space station’s forward docking port, connected the the Harmony module.
It’s very easy to get mesmerized by the video, but you can always keep it in the background of your computer screen (there are some replays as there is signal loss when the ISS is on the other side of Earth from the receiver, but there are also helpful descriptions at the bottom of the screen. It is a YouTube video.
Sunrise is very soon!
h/t: Ginger K.
I know a place that uses ISS live video as a screen saver for its big screens. Looks and feels wicked cool walkin’ into the room.
This is really fascinating–I’m glad it is available. I only wish I knew what land forms and oceans I’m looking at!
Periodically, a little notice appears at the bottom center of the screen. E.g., when I scrolled back in time, I saw this: “North Pacific Ocean. Next up the US.”
ETA: Also, you can figure out what part of the planet you’re looking at on the video live feed by checking the current location of the space station at this link: https://track.issabove.info/stv
for real time location that would be nice to have along with this live feed:
https://spotthestation.nasa.gov/tracking_map.cfm
This is amazing thanks. It would be great to have on the t v while relaxing or meditating.
I often watch the live cam of penguin at Edinburgh zoo. It’s a great way to see what the weather is like before you even get out of bed 😁
Thanks a million! I just adore it.
Why are you spreading disinformation Jerry? My feed from the flat earth society tells me that the LACK of images from the ISS is evidence that the spherical hypothesis is false, along with the fake moon landing and myriad other bits of evidence. No wonder rational people don’t trust science anymore!
Fascinating. Thanks.
Fantastic! By the way, the most recent winner of the Booker Prize for fiction in the UK is a novel called Orbital by Samantha Harvey. I guess you could call it a meditation on the Overview Effect through the imagined consciousness of 6 astronauts/cosmonauts (2 are Russian) on the space station. I found it compelling, though it probably won’t appeal to readers who prefer their novels to be full of action and dramatic peripeteia.
Yes, I read Orbital a couple of weeks ago and this video feed reinforced that realization of constant motion from light to night to light every 90 minutes. Station seems to move so quickly across the planet.
Thanks for the link. I had missed it on my regular reading of Space.com