W. Jody Mandeville, MITRE Corporation, Tim McLaughlin, MITRE, Steve Bygren, MITRE, Chris Randell, MITRE
Keywords: astronomy, GEODSS, clouds
Abstract:
This paper presents a comparison between the Infrared Cloud Imager (IRCI) used at Ground-based Electro-Optical Deep Space Surveillance (GEODSS) sites and the Visible Cloud Imager (VCI) developed using a COTS all-sky camera. The cloud imagers are used to create exclusion maps for GEODSS observations based on detected cloud locations. Excluding observation attempts in obscured areas of the sky is done to improve the allocation of sensor resources. Estimates are made for atmospheric extinction across the entire sky by comparing known star brightness to measured brightness. Data for the comparison were collected at the GEODSS test site located in Yoder, Colorado for a variety of cloud conditions.
Date of Conference: September 15-18, 2015
Track: Poster