ATLAS AGENA R/B(2)

ATLAS AGENA R/B(2) is a spent rocket body associated with United States, launched on 1977-05-23 from Cape Canaveral, Florida on the CANYON 7 launch. With over 49 years in orbit, it has far exceeded many satellites’ design lifetimes. It orbits in Medium Earth Orbit (MEO) at altitudes between 29,191 km and 41,244 km with an inclination of 6.3°. It travels at approximately 11,145 km/h (3.10 km/s), completing one full orbit every 23 hours 27 minutes — that’s roughly 1.02 orbits per day. Its orbital eccentricity of 0.1449 gives it a noticeably elliptical path, with significant altitude variation between perigee and apogee. At geostationary altitude, there is no meaningful atmospheric drag — this object will remain in orbit indefinitely unless actively deorbited. Spent rocket bodies like ATLAS AGENA R/B(2) are among the largest pieces of uncontrolled space debris and are priority targets for collision avoidance manoeuvres and future active debris removal efforts.

ATLAS AGENA R/B(2) orbits at an average altitude of 35,218 km in Medium Earth Orbit, the region between LEO and GEO (2,000–35,786 km). MEO’s higher altitude gives each satellite a much larger ground footprint than LEO, meaning fewer spacecraft are needed for global coverage — but signal latency is higher and radiation from the Van Allen belts is a significant design constraint. Within ±50 km of ATLAS AGENA R/B(2)’s average altitude, there are currently 2 active payloads and 8 tracked debris or rocket body fragments. This is a relatively sparse altitude band, containing less than 1% of all active satellites. With an inclination of 6.3°, ATLAS AGENA R/B(2) passes over latitudes between 6.3°N and 6.3°S, concentrating coverage over equatorial and near-equatorial regions. Low-inclination orbits maximise revisit rates over specific tropical zones. United States operates approximately 12,413 active satellites in total.