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With mere hours to go until Christmas Day now, children around the world are eagerly anticipating the arrival of Santa’s sleigh.

And on Christmas Eve, you and your family may even be able to see Santa and his reindeer flying through the sky over the UK.

The sleigh - disguised as the International Space Station (ISS) - is expected to be visible from the UK for a brief three minutes on December 24.

That's long enough to show your family Santa on his travels around the world.

The ISS orbits Earth at a height of around 250 miles, meaning the space station makes around 16 trips around Earth every single day.

NASA explained: “[The ISS] is the third brightest object in the sky and easy to spot if you know when to look up.

(Image: Getty)

“Visible to the naked eye, it looks like a fast-moving plane only much higher and traveling thousands of miles an hour faster!”

However, to see the ISS with your family, you’ll need to be on the ball as the space station is only going to visible for a short window.

On Christmas Eve , the ISS will be visible for three minutes from 06:06 GMT .

For your best chance of seeing it, look south-west in the sky.

If you miss it, there’s a second chance to show your family Santa in the night sky, having dropped off his presents.

The ISS will also be visible for four minutes on Christmas Day from 06:53 - keep an eye on the south-west sky to see it.

That's when Santa is returning home to Lapland after finishing his deliveries around the globe.

What to look for

Here's a guide to spotting the ISS from Twitter's resident amateur astronomer, @VirtualAstro .

"When the ISS passes over it will appear as an incredibly bright star like object or plane without flashing lights moving across the sky, it can be at times the brightest object in the night sky second to the Moon.

"As the station rises (from a westerly direction) it usually gets brighter but can be a challenge to spot at first. Make sure you have checked where it will rise from."

For more information on when you can see the space station passing overhead, visit the meteorwatch.org website.

You can also download an ISS tracking app from the App Store or Google Play Store, or visit NASA’s Spot The Station website here .