Terrestrial Coordinate System
Measured in degrees north or south from the equatorial plane.
What is Latitude?
A point determined by the intersection of the equatorial plane of the Earth and its orbital plane.
What is the First Point of Aries?
A path that a celestial body follows in its motions through space.
What is an Orbit?
The measurement of the focal length over the semi-major axis.
What is Eccentricity?
Half of the long-axis of an ellipse.
What is the Semi-Major Axis?
A line along the surface of the Earth connecting the poles.
What is a meridian?
What is Right Ascension (RA)?
The point in a satellite's orbit which is farthest from the occupied focus and where it has its lowest velocity.
What is the Apogee?
The distance from a foci to the geometric center.
What is the Focal Length
The angular measurement between the equatorial plane and the orbital plane, measured clockwise at the ascending node.
What is Inclination?
Uses the UTM coordinate system and can specify a location within one meter squared precision.
What is the Military Grid Reference System (MGRS)?
A line drawn around the circumference of the celestial sphere halfway between the celestial poles.
What is the Celestial Equator?
The curve traced by a point moving in a plane, such that the sum of its distance from two fixed points, or foci, is constant.
What is an Ellipse?
The two characteristics that define ellipses.
What is degree of flatness (eccentricity) and length of its long axis?
The point where the satellite intersects the equatorial plane as the satellite moves from South to North.
The projection of objects in space into their apparent position in the sky as viewed from the Earth.
What is the Celestial Sphere?
Angular distance of an object North or South of the Celestial Equator. Also known as Celestial Latitude.
What is Declination?
What is Kepler's 2nd Law: The Law of Equal Areas?
The line which passes through the center and terminates on the ellipse.
What is the Minor Axis?
The orbit size is responsible for determining these two characteristics of an orbit.
What is Period and Energy?
An Earth-Center Earth-Fixed (ECEF) terrestrial reference system and geodetic datum. Consists of 4 major components.
What is the World Geodetic System 1984 (WGS 84)?
This marks the first day of Spring.
What is the Vernal Equinox?
Two astronomers who worked together to conclude that planets travel in orbits that are not quite circular.
Who are Johannes Kepler and Tycho Brahe?
What is the Occupied Focus?
The angular measurement from perigee to the satellite's current position, measured in the direction of the satellite motion.
What is True Anomaly/ Time of Perigee Passage?