Highly elliptical orbit Highly elliptical orbit A highly elliptical orbit (HEO) is an elliptic orbit with high eccentricity, usually referring to one around Earth. Examples of inclined HEO orbits include Molniya orbits, named after the Molniya Soviet communication satellites which used them, and tundra orbits. Such extremely elongated orbits have the advantage of long dwell times at a point in the sky during the approach to, and descent from, apogee. Bodies moving through the long apogee dwell appear to move slowly, and remain at high altitude over high-latitude ground sites for long periods of time. This makes these elliptical orbits useful for communications
Claimed moons of Earth the Earth–Moon system, whereas the orbit of a quasi-satellite would negligibly change if Earth and the Moon were suddenly removed because a quasi-satellite is orbiting the Sun on an Earth-like orbit in the vicinity of Earth. Earth possesses one known trojan, a small Solar System body caught in the planet's gravitationally stable Lagrangian point. This object, is roughly 300 metres across. Like quasi-satellites, it orbits the Sun in a 1:1 resonance with Earth, rather than Earth itself. On 14 September 2006, an object estimated at 5 meters in diameter was discovered in near-polar orbit around Earth. Originally thought to be