STARGAZERS will be able to spot the International Space Station (ISS) as it streaks across the skies above Oxfordshire tonight.

As it passes over the county in the night sky it will be visible as a glowing dot moving east to west across the horizon.

The ISS looks like a bright star or fast-moving plane and has no flashing lights and doesn’t make a sound.

Photographer Mark Hemsworth snapped this dramatic picture of the space station silhouetted in front of the moon from Chilson Hill Farm, near Chipping Norton, last night.

Mr Hemsworth captured the space station as it made two visible passes across the heavens at 5.30pm and 7.04pm.

He tracked it using NASA's website to discover which from direction it would appear in the sky and then used his NIKON D810 with a 800mm lens with a two-times converter to capture this close up of the space station.

The photographer also used a 66mm lens to capture it as a white streak across the sky.

He said: "It was my first go at at it and I'm quite pleased with the results, although I'm sure people could come up with better.

"It's amazing when it pops up and you think British astronaut Tim Peake is only about 250 miles away."

Oxford Mail:

Mr Peake launched his six-month space mission in December to become the first British astronaut to spend time aboard the International Space Station.

Tonight is one of nine evenings when the space station will be visible in the night sky - as long as it is not too cloudy.

Oxfordshire stargazers will be able to see the ISS from 6.13pm tonight for about four minutes when it will rise from the west and pass straight overhead, but it will also be visible for a few seconds at 7.48pm.

It will also be visible for two minutes tomorrow night, five minutes on Saturday and three minutes or so on Sunday.

The station has been in orbit around the Earth since 1998 and is manned by astronauts from across the globe.

It serves as a microgravity and space environment research laboratory in which crew members conduct experiments in biology, human biology, physics, astronomy, meteorology, and other fields.

Visit spotthestation.nasa.gov/sightings/