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Satellites: Earths
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Satellites have been around ever since the planets were created. Do you know that when you look up into the sky and see the moon you are actually looking at a natural satellite. Satellites are anything natural or man made that orbit a body of matter or planet. The first manmade Satellite was the Russian Sputnik1 which was launched in 1957. Then the first American satellite Vanguard 1 was launched into space in 1959. It discovered the radiation belt around the Earth.
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Satellites in a high altitude, geosynchronous orbit are always in contact with Earth. Ground stations can contact satellites in low orbits as often as 12 times a day. During each contact, the satellite transmits information and receives instructions. Each contact must be completed during the time the satellite passes overhead -- about 10 minutes.
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Satellites can be celestial, such as a moon orbiting a planet in the solar system, or a planet in the solar system orbiting the sun. Satellites can ... be man-made. Man-made satellites are typically launched into outer space from earth to collect data, photos and other information about Earth and all the many things that exist around it.
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In 1955, the United States and the Soviet Union announced plans to launch artificial satellites. On Oct. 4, 1957, the Soviet Union launched Sputnik 1, the first artificial satellite. It circled Earth once every 96 minutes and transmitted radio signals that could be received on Earth. On Nov. 3, 1957, the Soviets launched a second satellite, Sputnik 2. It carried a dog named Laika, the first animal to soar in space. The United States launched its first satellite, Explorer 1, on Jan. 31, 1958, and its second, Vanguard 1, on March 17, 1958.
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On July 26, 1995, Amanda Bosh of Lowell Observatory announced the discovery of at least two and perhaps four new satellites of Saturn. The discovery was based upon images taken by the Hubble Space Telescope on May 22, 1995, when Saturn's rings were tilted edge-on to the Earth. Every 15 years, Earth passes through Saturn's ring plane, an event that provides astronomers an opportunity to discover new satellites that are normally lost in the glare of the planet's bright ring system. Astronomers discovered 13 of Saturn's moons during ring-plane crossings from 1655 to 1980. Other satellites were identified during the Voyager spacecraft flybys of Saturn in the early 1980s.
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As you can see from this image taken today from GOES-East, geostationary satellites are capable of continually viewing large areas of the Earth. These geostationary (GEO) satellites are ... able to provide immediate alerting and identification of 406 MHz beacons. The GEO satellites are not able to use Doppler location processing since they have no relative motion between them and the emergency beacons. Therefore, they are not able to determine a location for a beacon. They can, however, provide immediate alerts. This is a valuable tool for SAR personnel since it allows them to begin their initial verification of the alert using the National 406 MHz Beacon Registration Database. Often this detective work yields a general location of the vessel or aircraft in distress and SAR assets can be readied or dispatched to that general area.
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