All you have to do to perform a rendezvous is to get the two vehicles into the same orbital plane. After that it’s just a matter of allowing the vehicle with the smaller semi-major axis to catch up with the other. This may take several hours or even days depending on the separation between the vehicles and the geometry of the orbits.
If the LSAM/EDS is in an orbit with an inclination of 28.5 degrees, then there’ll be one launch window per day when Cape Canaveral rotates into position where a new launch can match the plane of the existing orbit. (If the LSAM/EDS is in a higher inclination orbit, then there are two launch windows – one when Canaveral passes through the orbital plane with the vehicle moving from north to south, and the other when moving south to north.) I don’t know how long each launch window will be, but I’m sure they’ll be pretty short. There isn’t much margin for error in getting the orbital planes to match.
If the first vehicle is launched on a northerly heading, then the resulting orbit will be one with an inclination greater than 28.5 degrees and the descending part of the orbit lying ahead to the east of Canaveral. A few hours after launch Cape Canaveral will pass again through this orbital plane and the second vehicle can then be launched on a southerly heading matching the plane of the first launch. By carefully selecting the orbits and the timing, the two vehicles can be placed in orbit separated by a short distance.
|