Mercury - Perigee and Apogee Calculator

Mercury Perigees and Apogees Calculator
For the 9799-Year Span From 200 AD to 9998 AD
Built Around the NASA/JPL Horizons API
PHP Horizons Interface by Jay Tanner

Year Time Zone UTC

Optional Location Label

Double-Click Within Text Area to Select ALL Text

===========================================================================
               ALL MERCURY PERIGEES AND APOGEES FOR THE YEAR 2024
               ==================================================
               Time Zone UTC+00:00
               

               Dates refer to the modern Gregorian calendar.

========================================================================
 EVENT   Julian Date UTC   Calendar Date     Time UTC    Dist. AU/mi/km
------- ----------------- ---------------  -----------  ----------------
Apogee  2460361.342062198 2024-Feb-20-Tue  08:12:34 PM   1.3903333807928
                                                          129,239,562 mi
                                                          207,990,913 km

Perigee 2460415.806768617 2024-Apr-15-Mon  07:21:45 AM   0.5760131793850
                                                           53,543,770 mi
                                                           86,170,345 km

Apogee  2460476.576007092 2024-Jun-15-Sat  01:49:27 AM   1.3230569870116
                                                          122,985,830 mi
                                                          197,926,508 km

Perigee 2460538.369244608 2024-Aug-15-Thu  08:51:43 PM   0.6083113793114
                                                           56,546,075 mi
                                                           91,002,087 km

Apogee  2460591.998526001 2024-Oct-08-Tue  11:57:53 AM   1.4185522961923
                                                          131,862,674 mi
                                                          212,212,403 km

Perigee 2460650.449811980 2024-Dec-05-Thu  10:47:44 PM   0.6783591510199
                                                           63,057,423 mi
                                                          101,481,085 km
========================================================================

NOTE:
As one can plainly see, in the case of Mercury, there are multiple
perigee/apogee events per calendar year, as many as three of each
and sometimes one extra event. For the perigee/apogee events of
the year, we could choose the lowest perigee and the largest
apogee values of the year.

Mercury is constantly moving either towards or away from Earth,
except at the perigee/apogee points, where it momentarily stands
still, then its radial distance reverses trend.

Double-Click Within Text Area to Select ALL Text


NOTES:

[1] This Mercury perigee and apogee calculator spans the 9799 year
    period from 200 AD to 9998 AD.

    It was written in PHP v7.4.9 and makes internal calls to the
    NASA/JPL Horizons API v1.1

    Julian Dates (JD) and Calendar Dates:
    JD <  2299160.5 = Refers to Old-Style Julian Calendar Dates

    JD >= 2299160.5 = Refers to Modern Gregorian Calendar Dates

    Given JD = General Julian Date, then the Julian Day Number
               on the Calendar is JD Number = floor(JD + 0.5)

    Dates up to 1582-Oct-04-Thu refer to the Julian calendar.
    Dates from  1582-Oct-15-Fri refer to the Gregorian calendar.

    Technically speaking, there are no calendar dates in the range
    from 1582-Oct-05-Fri to 1582-Oct-14-Sun because those 10 dates
    were dropped from the calendar during the Julian to Gregorian
    calendar transition to bring dates of the seasons back into
    alignment with the sun and the rule for leap year was changed
    to prevent the previous calendar error from recurring.

    The date following 1582-Oct-04-Thu was 1582-Oct-15-Fri, the
    official first date on our modern Gregorian calendar system.



[2] Occasionally a time-out may occur if the JPL Horizons server
    is temporarily unavailable or too busy and an error occurs.

    If such a crash or hang-up does occur, simply refresh and try
    again.



[3] UT1 = Old Universal Time Scale - Solar based.
          Old previous UT time scale used for years up to 1961.

    UTC = Coordinated Universal Time Scale - Atomic based.
          Newer UT time scale used from 1962 to date.
          World times are now based on this standard.

    LT  = Local Time for the given time zone based on the
          given +/− HH:MM offset.

          Time Zone Offset Convention:
          West of Greenwich, time zone offsets are negative.
          East of Greenwich, time zone offsets are positive.



[4] Standard times are assumed. To adjust for Daylight Saving or
    Summer Time, add 1 hour to the standard times taking care to
    watch for any change of date -OR- subtract 1 hour from the
    time zone offset, which will automatically handle any date
    change.

    For example, the time zone offset for Eastern Standard Time
   (EST) is normally -5 hours. However, when Eastern Daylight Time
   (EDT) is in effect, use a time zone offset of -4 hours instead.
    The computed times will be in EDT and automatically handle any
    date changes.



[5] There is an optional location label that can be applied to the
    computed table for reference.  However, any label should match
    the indicated time zone so as to be accurate and make sense.

    For example, if using the time zone offset for India, putting
   'New York City, USA' as the location, would be rather absurd
    and an inaccurate match between location name and time zone.

    The label can consist of any printable plain-text string and
    defaults to 'Greenwich, England' at Time Zone Offset +00:00.



[6] This program implements a cookie to store and recall the year
    and other interface settings between calls. It does not track,
    monitor or perform any other activity. If you navigate away
    and come back later, the interface settings stored in the
    cookie will be recalled from your last visit.

    Each call will refresh the cookie for up to 7 days retention
    unless deleted sooner. There is no harm in deleting the cookie.
    The program will simply revert to the original default values.

Download PHP 7 Source Code For This Program
Program by Jay Tanner
Revised: Friday - March 03, 2023 at 01:47:42 UTC - PHP v7.4.9