World Wide Panorama - 'Borders' - March 2006

Radio Communications at Home - Kinsale Co. Cork Ireland

Listening to and Viewing live images from Space

Radio waves ignore man made borders - So we are free to listen to the world.

Nowhere is this more true than with signals from space.

The sound you can hear (if you click the play button above) comes from a NOAA weather satellite. About the size of a car and weighing 588kg it travels at 26,840 kph. At an altitude of about 800 Km. its polar orbit of the earth takes about 90 minutes.

As the earth rotated beneath it, the satelite 'sees' every part of the earth twice a day.

It is wonderful to see the computer graphics predict where the satellite is and then hear its 'ping' sound as it comes over the horizon. Typically, here in Ireland I can first 'hear' it as it is flies north over Algeria in Africa.

The sound represents the data burst from its on board camera. Using a relatively simple radio and a computer, this data builds, line by line, into a real time image (visible and infra-red) of the earth as it flies overhead.

Guess what? Not a single Border shows up on the images!

So - my contributiuon to the theme of Borders is - 'No Borders visible from space'

And yes - you guessed it - I have a very tolerant partner who insisted that my Radio Rack resides in the dining room :-)

Sample images here - Images

Got a fast machine and a fast internet connection? Click here for a Full Screen Panorama

Show this location on Google Maps