Orbit Molniya

Figure 1: The Molniya orbit. Usually the period from perigee +2 hours to perigee +10 hours is used to transmit to the northern hemisphere

Groundtrack of Molniya orbit. In the operational part of the orbit from apogee −3 hours to apogee +3 hours the satellite is north of 55.5° N (latitude of for example central Scotland, Moscow and southern part of Hudson Bay)

Orbit Molniya (Rusia: Молния; IPA: [molnʲɪjə] (mendengarkan), "Lightning") adalah jenis orbit yang sangat elips dengan kemiringan 63,4 derajat, argumen dari perigee dari -90 derajat dan periode orbit satu setengah hari sidereal. Molniya orbit diberi nama setelah serangkaian satelit komunikasi Soviet / Rusia Molniya yang telah menggunakan jenis orbit ini sejak pertengahan 1960-an.

Untuk mendapatkan cakupan elevasi tinggi terus menerus dari belahan bumi utara, setidaknya tiga pesawat ruang angkasa Molniya yang diperlukan.

Referensi

• Molniya Orbits Diarsipkan 2016-01-31 di Wayback Machine. by Jerry Jon Sellers
• Orbital Mechanics by Robert A. Braeunig
• Molniya-1 spacecraft by Mark Wade of Encyclopedia Astronautica
• JAVA applet animating the orbit of a satellite Diarsipkan 2011-07-19 di Wayback Machine. in an elliptic Kepler orbit around the Earth. For a Molniya orbit, set the semi-major axis to 26562 km and eccentricity to 0.74105.
• Real time satellite tracking for a typical Molniya satellite
• 3D Molniya constellation viewer Diarsipkan 2008-04-07 di Wayback Machine. (no longer available)
• illustration of the communication geometry provided by satellites in 12-hour Molniya orbits (video)