• TWeaK@feddit.uk
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    7 months ago

    There may be times when the sun is eclipsed by the earth, but this will be infrequent.

    This will happen once per day lol. For a geostationary orbit anyway, as the orbital period is 24 hours.

    The point, as you mentioned before, is that the nighttime/eclipse part of this period will be very short and the day very long. Our night lasts hours, a geostationary satellite’s night is minutes (maybe a little over 1 hour for the longest ones).

    This website calculates eclipse periods for satellites: https://www.satellite-calculations.com/Satellite/satellite_eclipse.htm Apparently it’s a seasonal thing, like 3 months you get daily eclipses, 3 months you get no eclipse, then another 3 months on and another 3 off. The 3 months with eclipses are the around the equinoxes, so Feb-Apr and Aug-Oct.

    • Wanderer@lemm.ee
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      7 months ago

      The Equator isn’t in line with the angle the earth revolves around the sun.

      • TWeaK@feddit.uk
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        7 months ago

        Yup that’s what I gathered from this. Literally had the “duh” realisation as I was writing that comment.

        Eclipses still happen once per day, when they happen, it’s just also seasonal with no eclipses in the summer and winter.