Der Himmel Über London.
The sky at night over London is alive. Perhaps not with immortal angels listening in to the thoughts of those down below but very much alive it is.
A camera, a tripod and an Internet forum thread with tips on settings was everything we needed but for the skies themselves. Then, for a handful of nights in February, the heavens pitched in to show that, yes, alive indeed they are.
A trail of white lights: a stream running from left to right like an avenue in the sky over the western part of the city. Further to the left and higher up, a faint halo: a stack of Plasmon biscuits made of red lines and dots. Planes coming in to land at Heathrow airport; more planes – or perhaps the same – patiently waiting for their turn in a ‘stack’, a gigantic three-dimensional racetrack where planes enter from up above and descend, slowly but steadily, until it’s their turn to line up for the runways. As they proceed, as they move about the sky, they leave a faint but indelible trace on the sequence of 1 and 0s that make the RAW file captured by my camera’s sensor. In the deepening turquoise of London’s evening, the sky is not populated by angels. It’s business consultants coming home, travellers transferring on to the late night long hauls, it’s pilots and cabin crews. People.
On our second attempt the twilight had well and truly been washed away from the sky. We left the camera on its tripod, quietly whirring away, and went about our business. When we returned, after well more than an hour, we had an unexpected surprise: not only had the sensor captured the pale, blinking lights of the jets but it had also recorded things we had never figured we could see. Strange curving lines – some green, some white, some stronger, some paler – bisecting the dotted vectors of commercial flights. They were so intriguing that we ignored the novelty of having been able to capture not just Heathrow’s but also City’s traffic: what were they?
There are an estimated 4,600 satellites orbiting around Earth, not including junk. Tiny moons we can’t see with naked eye but that, still basking in direct sunlight, describe their serene trajectories as they allowed humans to communicate with one another, share Instagram photos or spy over unsuspecting fellow earthlings.
Night #3 brought a change. A breeze from the east meant a shift in air operations: airliners would no longer cruise over the city en route to Heathrow, opting instead for an approach that led them above Windsor. Take offs, on the other side, would aim for the city, swerving gently over north London to avoid the centre. Fully expecting a less crowded scene we nonetheless set up our camera pointing northwards, ready to capture whatever may come.
Boy weren’t we in for a surprise.
Beacons criss-crossed the sky in delicate networks, the lights of the departing widebodies bound for the East and Africa mingling with thin necklaces of green and red anti-collision lights of those flights that already were at cruising altitude. Here and there, like old friends stopping by for a quick greet, were the satellites, sailing higher than anyone could.
Days of morning fog ensued before, eventually, a clear dawn appeared. A clear dawn with no easterly winds. As they arrived from China, Singapore and South Africa the early morning flights lined up diligently and, one after the other, came in to land with their cargo of yawning families, execs straightening the knot of their ties and window seat dreamers. To the east, behind the towers of Canary Wharf, a golden glow announced a new day.
