Reentry time prediction using atmospheric density corrections
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abstract
Errors in the upper atmosphere density models have a significant influence on the accuracy of orbit prediction and, specifically, on the accuracy of reentry time prediction for space objects (SO). Determination of current time corrections to the atmosphere density and their use in orbit prediction is proposed as a method to increase the accuracy of reentry time prediction. The potential effect of increasing the accuracy of SO reentry time prediction, associated with accounting for the corrections to the NRLMSIS-00 atmosphere density model(Picone et al., 2002), is estimated for SOs having both spherical and nonspherical shapes. The use of the atmospheric density corrections provides visibility into the time variations of individual SO aerodynamic characteristics and allows their use in predicting the reentry time.
