Comparison of Various Methods for Orbital Measurements Processing

The application of joint measurements processing in updating satellite orbits faces the necessity of correct accounting for random perturbations. In the early 70-ies it was suggested to improve the least square technique (LST) based on accounting for random perturbations in "weighing" the measurements. This improvement was called the method for Optimal Filtration of Measurement (OFM). The comparison of the accuracy of estimates, obtained with using the LST (with extension and without extension of the state vector), as well as the OFM method, was performed. It was shown that, in the presence of perturbations, the application of the OFM method provides the best accuracy.