Python and visualising Planet Orbits
I wanted to be able to visualise a Kepler Orbit and found some code to do this. After being able to plot the orbit I decided that I wanted to represent the solar system planets orbiting the sun and looked for some code to do this.
I was still thinking about launch windows from a science fiction book I was reading and wanted to figure out how that would work. So being able to show the orbiting planets I’d be able to see where the orbits of earth and the mars were closest and where they were far apart.
I did a video on the methods I’d used :
Links to sources and to code below
Further to my previous video Python, Bing Chat & Astronomy • Video I wanted to look at being able to use a python method to calculate a Kepler Planet Orbit andfound a script that will do that. Kepler orbit – https://pyastronomy.readthedocs.io/en… After finding the script I then wanted to look at planets in their orbit to look at the idea of a “launch window” fror a hypothetical rocket going between earth and Mars. So tried to use Ptyhon to draw planets in orbital motion to visualize the progression of the planets around the sun. 1-A More Approximate Position of the Planets using JPL Ephemerides (Spirographs!!)- • A More Approximat… 2-Python – How to Program the Solar System- • Python – How to P… 3-Planet Simulation In Python – Tutorial- • Planet Simulation… Simulating Planetary Orbits- https://fiftyexamples.readthedocs.io/… JPL Orbit Viewer- https://ssd.jpl.nasa.gov/tools/orbit_… Kepler orbit – https://pyastronomy.readthedocs.io/en… A bit of a play with some codes and I will park this exercise and move on to making a local e ephemeris for my location in Wellington NZ with Alt/Az coordinates. I may come back to this project later, and enjoyed what I have done to date. You can download all the code that was demonstrated in this video: Link to scripts for download- https://drive.google.com/drive/folder…
Update to traveling to Mars
Image below from here
I looked on the NASA website and for Mars Curiosity Rover it took 7 months but as it was unmanned I suppose it could withstand much higher accelerations than if it was manned, so could go faster and brake harder. So where I was estimating around 88 days or 3 months I was way off. (Image below from Here)
How long does it take to get to Mars? In this article it suggests around 9 months.
According to NASA (opens in new tab), a one-way trip to Mars would take about nine months. If you wanted to make it a round-trip, all in all, it would take about 21 months as you will need to wait about three months on Mars to make sure Earth and Mars are in a suitable location to make the trip back home.
Image below from here
End comment
The video goes through all the issues so I didn’t want to discuss in article as they are already covered.
