[FPSPACE] Astronomer captures old Soviet rocket stage after imaging ISS

[LARRY KLAES]

To quote from Spaceweather.com:

SPACE FOSSIL: On May 23rd, Ralf Vandebergh trained his backyard telescope on 
the International Space Station (ISS) as it flew over his home in the 
Netherlands. The picture he took revealed a bright, modern spaceport, 
bustling with crew and docked spaceships (Jules Verne and Progress M64).

Minutes later, another object flew overhead, small, dim, and, unlike the 
ISS, from the past. "It was the upper stage of a legendary Vostok 8A92M 
rocket, the same rocket used in the 1960s during the first Russian manned 
flights," says Vandebergh. "This one was launched in 1979." He swung his 
telescope to the old rocket body, took a picture, and placed the image 
beside that of the ISS:

http://www.spaceweather.com/swpod2008/26may08/Ralf-Vandebergh1_strip.jpg

"It was no easy job to catch this small object," he says. "The Vostok was 
dim and moving really fast compared to the ISS, making it difficult to keep 
it in the crosshairs of my finderscope as I tracked the spacecraft manually 
across the sky."

"This is like a fossil of space history in our night sky," he says. Indeed, 
you never know what might be flying overhead--even fossils.