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Retrieval of orbital maneuver information of Starlink satellites from SpaceX-released ephemerides by analytical and numerical methods
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张
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DOI：10.1016/j.asr.2026.03.062.png)
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Abstract
En 中文
Starlink satellites have caused widespread concern in the fields of astronomical observation and space situational awareness, as they are too numerous and their orbital states are relatively complex. It requires in-depth understanding and knowledge of fundamental information of orbital maneuvers of the Starlink satellites during their in-orbit operations to help improving the accuracy of orbit determination and prediction. SpaceX-released ephemerides contain predicted maneuvers of the Starlink satellites. Taking the orbital semi-major axis as a characteristic parameter for detection of orbital maneuvers, analytical and numerical methods are proposed to retrieve the orbital maneuvers of the Starlink satellites from the SpaceX-released ephemerides, and the fundamental maneuver information is investigated with examples in this paper. Using the ephemerides released by the SpaceX from September 1st to 5th, 2024 (UTC) for the selected Star-link satellites in the operational, parking, orbit raising and deorbit phases respectively, the time series of the orbital semi-major axis variations per unit time (1 min) caused by both the maneuver force and the atmosphere drag (which can be approximated as the maneuver force) are retrieved by the analytical method; and the corresponding time series of the orbital semi-major axis variations per unit time (1 min) caused solely by the maneuver force are also retrieved by the numerical method. Then, the fundamental information of orbital maneuvers of the selected Starlink satellites is revealed intuitively. (c) 2026 COSPAR. Published by Elsevier B.V. All rights are reserved, including those for text and data mining, AI training, and similar technologies.
Keywords:
Starlink satellite
Orbital maneuver
SpaceX-released ephemeris
Analytical retrieval
Numerical retrieval
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