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Satellites view half the globe at once. But you know that just as well as I do.
by qubex 7y ago
Satellites view half the globe at once. But you know that just as well as I do.
- colejohnson66 7y agoNot true. How much is seen depends on the focal length and lens
- qubex 7y agoI suppose that’s true, abstractly speaking. But does it make sense to assume that the world’s meteorological community would put satellites into geosynchronous orbit that are not suited for the purpose of observing the Earth’s atmosphere from geosynchronous orbit? I think we can safely discount that assumption.
- majewsky 7y agoYou're assuming that "observing the Earth's atmosphere" is a yes/no question when it's actually a spectrum. I'm not familiar with the matter, but I can imagine a scenario like "We need to record a very particular part of the EM spectrum and all those existing satellites happen not to have suitable equipment for that."
- jobigoud 7y agoAnd distance. A satellite in polar orbit at 850km above the surface will only see a small part of the globe at once, even with a wide lens.
- jobigoud 7y ago> Satellites view half the globe at once. But you know that just as well as I do. They don't, because of perspective. Even satellites in Geosynchronous orbits don't see half the globe. They are above the equator but they can never see both poles at once. Satellites closer than that only see a small part of the globe. A satellite would have to be infinitely far away to see an entire hemisphere at once. A GPS satellite at 20000 km of altitude only sees 38% of the Earth. https://www.wtamu.edu/~cbaird/sq/2013/05/10/since-one-satellite-can-see-half-of-the-earth-why-do-we-need-more-than-two-satellites-in-a-given-network/ https://www.wtamu.edu/~cbaird/sq/2013/05/10/since-one-satell...