Kevin Fetter wrote: > > > To me it's a sun sync orbit, and not polar. > > And my definition of the polar familly is probably 8 deg. too wide ! > > To me polar means a close to 90 degree inclination orbit, like > > Gravity Probe B > 1 28230U 04014A 04336.61361717 -.00000134 00000-0 -21925-4 0 1818 > 2 28230 89.9939 163.3373 0002520 78.1535 281.9956 14.75689192 33163 A true polar orbit is inclined 90 deg; however, it is common practice to describe inclinations close to 90 deg as polar or quasi-polar. I tend to think of orbits inclined between about 70 deg and 110 deg as polar or quasi-polar. The majority of sun-synchronous orbits have been inclined between about 96 deg and 102 deg, so I regard them as polar orbit variants. I do not recall seeing any widely accepted formal definitions, but I would not be surprised to learn that they exist. Ted Molczan ------------------------------------------------------------------------- Subscribe/Unsubscribe info, Frequently Asked Questions, SeeSat-L archive: http://www.satobs.org/seesat/seesatindex.html
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