A Brand New Star

With the opening of the massive new solar panels on the International Space Station, observers on earth should be able to see it quite clearly at night. It may, in fact be as bright as Venus, currently the brightest object that can be seen from Earth.

Astronauts on board the International Space Station (ISS) unfurled a new pair of solar energy panels that sprout out of the end of a new 17.5-ton truss section, which was brought up by the space shuttle Atlantis. They are the largest solar panels ever taken to space; fully unfolded, they reach a length of 240 feet (73 meters). They are designed to double the ISS's capability to generate power from sunlight when they go online during a future shuttle mission.

The panels are made of layers of thin gold Mylar plastic, which are highly reflective

Like other satellites, the ISS shines by virtue of sunlight reflected off of its metallic skin. The station orbits approximately 213 miles (341 kilometers) above Earth.

How bright?

Before the ISS spread its new pair of gold wings, it was already the brightest of all space vehicles, at times appearing to shine with a brilliance equal to the planet Jupiter.  Now skywatchers should notice the orbiting outpost glowing with an even greater luster. 

Nobody knows exactly how much brighter it will be, but there's a good chance that it could be brighter than magnitude -3, approaching the glow of Venus, the brightest planet.  On this astronomers scale, smaller numbers denote brighter objects, and negative numbers are reserved for the handful of the very brightest.

As I have mentioned before, to find out when the best viewing times in your area are, you can look at NASA's tracking page or a website called Heavens Above. The latter requires registration.