Programming Assignment 3
Write a program that prints a list of the names, catalog numbers and o
ital inclinations of
all active geosynchronous satellites with high ( >= 45 degrees) o
ital inclination.
On the website
https:
celestrak.com/NORAD/elements
there is a link labeled Active Geosynchronous . Use the URL for this link to read in a list of the
active geosynchronous satellites.
Use a for loop to iterate through this list (3 lines at a time) and use an if statement to print
a satellite name and inclination only for satellites with inclination >= 45 degrees.
In the pdf document Program_Assign_2a.pdf posted with assignment 2 and also re-posted
with this assignment, on pages 4 and 5 is an example of a for loop. This loop prints the
names of all the satellites. This loop only looks at list element sat_list(i), which is the name
of the satellite. You will also need to use the sat_list element that contains the TLE line 2
data to extract the catalog number and o
ital inclination.
Upon seeing the output, you should see an obvious pattern. In the next assignment, we will
extract all the satellites that match this pattern to see if all such satellites have high
inclinations. Look up the class of satellites on the Internet to see what their purpose is.
Also, if you want to get more head start on future assignments, read about how to compute
the apogee and perigee of satellites from the TLE data. You can search “apogee perigee
from TLE”. One especially easy to use explanation is here:
http:
www.satobs.org/seesat/Dec-2002/0197.html
If you try computing some apogee/perigee values and want to check them, an easy way to
find data about a satellite is to search “NORAD
”. Where
numbe
is the catalog number of the satellite you are looking for.
This should not be a complicated program. I did not write my solution in as few lines as
possible, but still it is only 10 lines long, so if your program is growing large it is over
complicated.
https:
celestrak.com/NORAD/elements
http:
www.satobs.org/seesat/Dec-2002/0197.html
https:
celestrak.com/NORAD/elements/geo.txt