Orbital Decay of Low Earth Orbit Satellites: A Numerical Investigation

— Now a days the number of earth satellites orbiting in Low Earth Orbit (LEO) is increasing day by day. Low Earth Orbit (LEO) satellites play very crucial role in various spaced-based applications: such as communication, scientific researches and other important sectors, but they experience natural decay of their orbits due to atmospheric drag and other influencing factors. For low altitude, the air density is large enough which leads atmospheric drag to become the major influencing factor for orbital decay of LEO satellites. Investigating and predicting this decay is essential for satellite operators to optimize their mission duration and avoid space debris. In this paper, we shall present a numerical investigation of LEO satellite orbital decay using Python language employing 4th order Runge Kutta method in presence of quadratic drag. We shall investigate the decay behavior, life time duration and other relevant interesting parameters. Finally, we shall validate our numerical results against experimental data. This validation process will ensure us that our numerical model is accurate enough to estimate the real world orbital decay behavior of LEO satellites.