Re: [amsat-bb] Calculating satellite orbits in advance

["laura halliday" <marsgal42@xxxxxxxxxxx>]

Ronald Nutter <rnutter@networkref.com>
 wrote:

>My ARES group is considering the use of satellites in an upcoming exercise.
>The best I have been able to do is about 30 days in advance.  How far in
>advance can I reasonable hope to do a satellite pass projection, what kind
>of accuracy can I hope for and what software seems to be best for this type
>of projection ?

Since historical data are available (www.celestrak.com),
you can figure this out yourself: get some old data, get
some fresh data, generate some passes, and compare.

In October 1999 I generated some predictions for 0000 UTC
1 January 2000 to see what would be in the sky (I wanted
to watch satellite clocks roll over to Y2K), and the
predictions - even for the low-orbit stuff - were within a
few seconds.

All available programs use the same orbital models,
so the accurcy should be the same. Me? I use predict.
It serves my simple purposes.

Laura Halliday VE7LDH     "Que les nuages soient notre
Grid: CN89mg                       pied a terre..."
ICBM: 49 16.05 N 122 56.92 W     - Hospital/Shafte

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