How far can a satellite go into orbit?

Answer 1

The commonly used altitude classifications are Low Earth Orbit (LEO), Medium Earth Orbit (MEO) and High Earth Orbit (HEO). Low Earth orbit is any orbit below 2000 km, and Medium Earth Orbit is any orbit higher than that but still below the altitude for geosynchronous orbit at 35786 km. High Earth Orbit is any orbit higher than the altitude for geosynchronous orbit.

Answer 2

Interesting to think about. I did a few calculations.

The speed of a small satellite only depends on the mass of the central body and the satellite's

distance from it ... the closer the satellite is to the central body, the faster it moves. (A satellite

in low earth orbit moves about 8 km/sec, whereas the moon moves only about 1 km/sec.)

So in order to get a satellite going really fast, we have to put it in a tiny orbit ... as close as possible

to the center of the earth.

Here's the calculation I did: Imagine the whole mass of the earth packed into a ball with a diameter

of 100 feet (instead of 8,000 miles). That means we take the most dense planet in the solar system

and crush all of its mass down so it becomes about 1016 (ten million billion) times as dense as it

is now. And then we put a small satellite in orbit around it, flying just barely above the surface ...

at an orbital radius of 50 feet from the center of this mass. How fast does this satellite move ?

Here are my figures. You're welcome to repeat the calc and shoot them down.

(period)2 / (radius)3 = constant (Kepler and Newton)

The orbital radius is 50 ft.

The orbital circumference is (100 pi) feet = roughly 95.8 meters.

The orbital period is 19.1 microseconds

The orbital speed is 5.023 x 106 meters per second = roughly 1.7% of the speed of light.

So far, the answer to the question is not close at all.

Maybe we could get a different result if we look at something like a 10-foot orbit around a

super-massive black hole. But then we'd have to get into all the messy relativistic effects, and

I've already blown too much time on this question. I'm satisfied to leave it at "not close at all".

Answer 3

Satellites in low Earth orbit typically stay within 1,200 miles (2,000 kilometers) from Earth's surface. Geostationary satellites, which orbit at an altitude of about 22,000 miles (35,400 kilometers), are used for communication and weather monitoring due to their fixed position relative to Earth. Beyond that, satellites can reach much farther distances, such as those in deep space exploration missions.