Orbital Analyst

Spatial analysis and orbital mechanics intertwined. Learn PostGIS for spatial SQL, then layer in two-line element sets, SGP4 propagation, and ground-track geometry to answer questions like 'which spaceports can serve a sun-synchronous orbit?' or 'which countries does the ISS overfly in a 24-hour window?'.

What you'll learn

• Run spatial joins, buffers, intersections, and dissolve operations in QGIS and PostGIS.
• Read a TLE and explain what each Keplerian element means physically.
• Propagate a satellite using SGP4 in Python (skyfield) and produce ground-track GeoJSON.
• Compute coverage / line-of-sight from a ground station to a satellite at any time.
• Match spaceports to orbital regimes (LEO / GEO / SSO / Molniya) based on geometry alone.

Prerequisites

Ground Station Operator track or equivalent — you must be comfortable with coordinate systems, vector data in QGIS, and basic Python.

Tools you'll use

PostGIS 16 · skyfield · geopandas · Folium · matplotlib

Weekly curriculum (6 weeks)

• Week 5 Spatial operations: joins, buffers, intersects, dissolve
• Week 6 PostGIS: spatial SQL fundamentals
• Week 7 Orbital mechanics primer: TLEs and Keplerian elements
• Week 8 SGP4 propagation in Python with skyfield
• Week 9 Ground-to-satellite line-of-sight and coverage
• Week 10 Spaceports and orbits (Capstone 2 week) Capstone 2

Capstone 2: Ground-Track Coverage Tool

Given any TLE, produce ground track + coverage + country-overflight table.

Build a Python tool that, given any TLE as input, outputs (1) the 24-hour ground track as a GeoJSON LineString with timestamped vertices, (2) a coverage polygon assuming a 1000-km swath sensor, (3) a country-overflight table listing each country overflown with total dwell time in seconds. The country mapping must use the Natural Earth admin-0 boundary dataset (provided). Visualize the ground track on a Folium map, color-coded by altitude.