The Rebellion | Space Jockey
The Challenge | Space Jockey
The Earth Operations Center
The Earth Operations Center (EOC) is an app, where people can look at our planet from the different NASA satellites and get information on science possibilities. Also, it can predict co-locational points, when we'll be able to get science data from 2 sats!
Background
The app's has two goals.
- To provide users with information about everything that happens on LEO, such as spacecraft launches, space debris etc.
- To attempt to solve the "co-location": to determine, when two satellites are on the one position, and their instrument's swaths (areas on the ground they cover) are matching.
I've tried to solve both of these goals with an iPad app. The Earth and satellites going around it were made with SceneKit. When the user selects the satellite - onboard cam goes live, and the user sees other satellites and space debris around him. He can control it just like real spacecraft: using Pitch, Yaw and Roll sliders.
To solve the "co-location" I've recorded each instrument's field of view, projected it on map (virtually), and compared pair-by-pair with every other instrument. The pairs that match their locations, are the co-locational points we're looking for! To show that concept I went with the simple design, showing two satellites' names, instruments on them and short descriptions of the experiments we'll perform.
Also, I added the view of the latest image from NASA'S DSCOVR spacecraft (EPIC camera) and ISS position with predicted ground track.
Resources
The main resource I used in code is SGP4 library, used to track satellites using their TLE, which I got from Space-Track website. Also, I've used NASA API (particularly EPIC cam), and resources (like Earth texture and NASA logo). For the ISS ground track I've used Google Maps iOS API.
SpaceApps is a NASA incubator innovation program.