The GLAST (Fermi) Spacecraft in Orbit
GLAST will be launched into a circular orbit around the Earth at an altitude of about 560 km (350 miles). At that altitude, the observatory will circle Earth every 90 minutes. In sky-survey mode, GLAST will be able to view the entire sky in just two orbits, or about 3 hours. Because gamma rays in the GLAST's energy band are unable to penetrate the Earth's atmostphere, it is essential that GLAST perform its observations from space.
This beauty shot begins with the earth in full view and pans to reveal the spacecraft in orbit.
This beauty shot begins with the earth in full view, then pans to reveal the spacecraft and the gamma ray sky it will observe.
This beauty shot begins with the earth in full view, then pans to reveal the spacecraft and the gamma ray sky it will observe. This version is upresed to 1920x1080 and plays back at half-speed.
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Credits
Please give credit for this item to:
NASA/Goddard Space Flight Center Conceptual Image Lab
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Animator
- Chris Meaney (HTSI)
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Scientist
- Steven Ritz (NASA/GSFC)
Release date
This page was originally published on Friday, September 14, 2007.
This page was last updated on Wednesday, November 15, 2023 at 12:23 AM EST.
Missions
This visualization is related to the following missions:Series
This visualization can be found in the following series:Datasets used in this visualization
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[Fermi: LAT]
ID: 216Fermi Gamma-ray Large Area Space Telescope (GLAST) Large Area Telescope (LAT)
This dataset can be found at: http://fermi.gsfc.nasa.gov
See all pages that use this dataset -
[Fermi]
ID: 687
Note: While we identify the data sets used in these visualizations, we do not store any further details, nor the data sets themselves on our site.