Re: [amsat-bb] AO-40 orbit

[Paul Yeager <w4ski@xxxxxxxx>]

Shawn:

I guess it depends on what you mean by "nearly geostationary".

It's a very elliptical orbit, with the satellite rather close to Earth at 
perigee, and much farther away at apogee.

The orbit is such that on the best passes, you can "see" the satellite for 
fairly long periods of time, on the order of 10 to 12 hours.  The cycle of 
the orbits is such that while you may not have a good pass every day, 
everyone (around the world, or almost) gets a good pass every few days.

I operate portable, as I live on the north side of a mountain, which makes 
it hard to see AO-40 from home.  I have worked about 21 stations so far in 
two operating sessions, and they were from Europe and the US.  This is not, 
however, an exhaustive list of locations I can work from here.  The 
coverage area from here in western NC appears to include all of South 
America, Africa, Australia, and Japan.  Not all of these at the same time 
though!

I hope this answers your questions from a practical standpoint, there are 
many folks more qualified than I to expound on the technical aspects of 
A0-40's orbit.

See you on A0-40!

73,
Paul W4SKI

At 11:33 AM 9/10/02 -0500, you wrote:
>I've been watching AO-40's orbit with TrakSat and I'm befuddled. Is this a
>"nearly" geo-stationary orbit or something?
>-SHAWN-
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