Satellite Orbits and the Observation of the Earth - examples

  Visualisation in space of sun-synchronous satellite orbits

A sun-synchronous satellite has the following characteristics:
  its orbital plane makes a constant angle with the Earth-Sun direction.
  the sunlight ratio (of the satellite) is nearly constant and depends on this angle.
  every pass over a given latitude occurs at almost the same local time.

To visualise the orbital behaviour of a sun-synchronous satellite relative to the Sun and Earth movements, use the different view points in these two VRML animations.
Click here if you need a help to use VRML 2 


VRML animation VRML 2 animation:
Sun-synchronous satellite orbits in a sun centred and fixed stars oriented system of reference:

VRML animation VRML 2 animation:
Sun-synchronous satellite orbits in the right ascension-declination coordinate system.

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