Abstract
Consider the problem of spacecraft rendezvous, e.g., the return of the Lunar Excursion Module (LEM) to the Command Module (aka Command and Service Module or CSM) in orbit about the moon for the Apollo mission (see Fig. 6.1). Or consider the situation in which NASA’s Space Shuttle (crewed), the European Space Agency’s (ESA) Jules Verne Automated Transfer Vehicle (ATV, robotic), Russian Soyuz (crewed) or Progress (robotic), or Japanese H-II Transfer Vehicle (robotic) vehicle performs a rendezvous and docking with the International Space Station (ISS). For example, on March 27, 2008, the Jules Verne ATV conducted maneuvers “to guide the ship to an ‘interface point’ 24 miles behind and three miles below the station.” Later, the ATV performed a rendezvous and docking with the ISS.
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Notes
- 1.
George William Hill (1838–1914) must be considered a mathematician, but his mathematics was entirely based on that necessary to solve his orbit problems.
In 1861, Hill joined the Nautical Almanac Office working in Cambridge, Massachusetts. After 2 years he returned to West Nyack, NY where he worked from his home. Except for a period of 10 years from 1882 to 1892 when he worked in Washington on the theory and tables for the orbits of Jupiter and Saturn, this was to be his working pattern for the rest of his life.
E. W. Brown wrote:
He was essentially of the type of scholar and investigator who seems to feel no need of personal contacts with others. While the few who knew him speak of the pleasure of his companionship in frequent tramps over the country surrounding Washington, he was apparently quite happy alone, whether at work or taking recreation.
From 1898 until 1901, Hill lectured at Columbia University, but “characteristically returned the salary, writing that he did not need the money and that it bothered him to look after it.”
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Hintz, G.R. (2015). Spacecraft Rendezvous. In: Orbital Mechanics and Astrodynamics. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-09444-1_6
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