• Question: What is the period of a satellite?

    Asked by Amrit S. to Naziyah on 8 Mar 2021.
    • Photo: Naziyah Mahmood

      Naziyah Mahmood answered on 8 Mar 2021:

      That depends on what the satellite is doing 🙂
      A satellite is just an object which orbits a body (like how the Moon orbits the Earth, making it a satellite!)
      The period of a satellite is how long it takes it to complete one full orbit around the object it’s moving around.
      Like how the period of the Earth around the Sun is one year!
      So if it’s an Earth orbiting satellite, however long it takes for it to go around the Earth fully is it’s period 🙂

Comments

  • Photo: Ed

    Ed commented on :

    To add to what Naziyah said – the period of a satellite orbit is directly linked to its size. A smaller orbit has a shorter period. The smallest viable orbits (around 300km altitude) have periods of about 1.5 hours. The ISS orbit varies by about 50km, but has a minimum period of about 96 minutes.