Overflight frequency diagram – Extended work on satellite overflight analysis

Since 2020, the Swedish Armed Forces recognize space as an operational domain, alongside the ground, sea, air, and cyber domains. This means that there is an increasing need to understand and include the space domain in operational planning. This study expands on previous work done at FOI concerning the analysis of overflight data. Based on open-source satellite data, commercial software is used to calculate overflights for a chosen location. This report details two methods of analyzing overflight data, along with the strengths and weaknesses of these methods. The methods are complementary with different areas of use. The first method constitutes a direct analysis of overflight data based on current satellite data, while the other is a way of visualizing a larger set of overflight data from an entire year. This visualization or diagram we have chosen to call Overflight Frequency Diagram (OFD). By visualizing single satellites as well as constellations in OFDs the intention is to contribute to a deeper understanding of the space domain.