Naked-eye acquisition of visible near-earth satellitesThis paper develops visual sighting criteria for observing artificial near-earth satellites with the naked eye, and summarizes the mathematics needed to predict visibility efficiently from a set of mean orbital elements. It reports on a successful application of the sighting criteria and visibility-prediction mathematics, and shows that successful visual acquisition depends as much upon the observer's skill in recognizing the constellations as it does upon accurate visibility predictions.
Document ID
19890025287
Acquisition Source
Legacy CDMS
Document Type
Conference Paper
Authors
Mansfield, Roger L. (Ford Aerospace and Communications Corp. Colorado Springs, CO, United States)