finding the height of the sattellite?

Question

A spy satellite is in circular orbit around Earth. It makes one revolution in 6.03 hours. (Radius of the Earth=6.371 106 m)

(a) How high above Earth's surface is the satellite?

(b) What is the satellite's acceleration?


Without the correct asnwer to part A, i cannot get part b done.

The equation we were given is

r (height) = (G Me / w^2) ^1/3

i guess the question i have is, how to find w.
i took the gravitational constant of the earth, the mass of the earth, but the w (angular acceleration?) i cannot figure out.

thanks for the help.

yes. W is the angular velocity

Answer 1

If w is the angular velocity then you can get it by dividing 2*pi by the period in seconds.

G is the universal gravitational constant and is _not_ the same as g.

the r that you get will be the height from the centre of the earth so you will need to subtract the radius to get the altitude of your satellite.

Best of Luck - Mike

Answer 2

Are you sure that w is not the term for angular velocity--that is what it typically represents in situations like these. In that case, you can solve the problem because you know how long the satellite takes to orbit.