Elon Musk’s SpaceX and NASA successfully launched a rocket into space on Saturday (May 30th) and several people in Burnham-On-Sea caught a distant glimpse of it in the skies over Somerset.
The mission sees the Falcon 9 rocket carrying the Crew Dragon capsule head for the International Space Station.
Strapped inside are NASA astronauts Robert Behnken, 48, and Douglas Hurley, 43 who are making history – this is the first time astronauts will be launched into orbit from US soil in nine years, and it’s also a first for a private firm.
Skywatchers in the UK were told that they might be able to see the rocket flying over the UK 15 minutes after lift-off at around 8.37pm – and then also later at around 10.15pm very low on the horizon in the southwest.
Sure enough, it was spotted locally. Burnham-On-Sea.com reader Dawn Ward took this photo on an iPhone just after 10.15pm.
“One of the staff at Boots here in Burnham had been tracking the space shuttle and four of us had fantastic sightings as the sky conditions were perfect,” she told Burnham-On-Sea.com.
“It passed from west to east and we had perfect conditions, with no clouds at the time, so we had a perfect sighting. We had watched live on the internet from 7pm and it was a thrilling moment to see it pass over. History in the making.”
