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skyfielders / python-skyfield

Elegant astronomy for Python
MIT License
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Feature Request: Add eclipse/illumination times or something similar to the EarthSatellite object #362

Closed jacoffey3 closed 4 years ago

jacoffey3 commented 4 years ago

Basically I'm looking for an understanding of when the satellite is illuminated by the sun, and when it is in eclipse. There are a few posts about this I've found in other places:

https://space.stackexchange.com/questions/37713/how-can-i-calculate-if-a-satellite-is-currently-in-sunlight-or-eclipse-using-pye/40217#40217

https://space.stackexchange.com/questions/4339/calculating-which-satellite-passes-are-visible

It is commonly used in mission planning and adding this method would allow, in conjunction with the find_events function, calculating which events are potentially visible.

brandon-rhodes commented 4 years ago

I agree that Skyfield would be improved by that feature! Let's leave this issue open until I or someone else can come up with some code.

brandon-rhodes commented 4 years ago

(But as I won't be working on it immediately I guess I should un-assign myself so that other contributors will know that it's available to work on.)

jacoffey3 commented 4 years ago

I've found a solution for it. I'll see if I can at clean it up and get it PR worthy. Also - I appreciate the prompt reply!