ATLAS 5 CENTAUR R/B

ATLAS 5 CENTAUR R/B is a spent rocket body associated with United States, launched on 2007-12-10 from Cape Canaveral, Florida on the QUASAR 15? launch. After 19 years in orbit, it continues to be tracked by global surveillance networks. It orbits in Medium Earth Orbit (MEO) at altitudes between 296 km and 12,784 km with an inclination of 60.8°. It travels at approximately 20,003 km/h (5.56 km/s), completing one full orbit every 4 hours 4 minutes — that’s roughly 5.91 orbits per day. Its orbital eccentricity of 0.4836 gives it a noticeably elliptical path, with significant altitude variation between perigee and apogee. Spent rocket bodies like ATLAS 5 CENTAUR R/B are among the largest pieces of uncontrolled space debris and are priority targets for collision avoidance manoeuvres and future active debris removal efforts.

ATLAS 5 CENTAUR R/B orbits at an average altitude of 6,540 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 5 CENTAUR R/B’s average altitude, there are currently 0 active payloads and 6 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 60.8°, ATLAS 5 CENTAUR R/B passes over latitudes between 60.8°N and 60.8°S, covering most populated land masses in both hemispheres. This mid-inclination band balances global coverage with efficient launch energy requirements. United States operates approximately 12,413 active satellites in total.