When to use JWST L2 Halo Orbit 3D Explorer
Use this explorer when you want to show why Webb sits at the Sun-Earth L2 point instead of orbiting Earth directly, and how a halo path keeps it out of Earth's and the Moon's shadow.
- Teaching why L2 lets one sunshield block the Sun, Earth, and Moon at once
- Explaining the difference between orbiting a planet and orbiting an unstable Lagrange point
- Showing why Webb needs station-keeping burns roughly every 21 days
This is an educational halo-path approximation, not a live tracker or a precomputed ephemeris.
Walk the controls in the step-by-step guide, or compare options in vs alternatives. Open the JWST L2 Halo Orbit 3D Explorer.
Companion guide for the JWST L2 Halo Orbit 3D Explorer. This page sits alongside the step-by-step walkthrough and the comparison against alternatives, so you can move between timing guidance, control instructions, and the numbers table without leaving the guide set.
The explorer itself runs entirely client-side in the browser with the vendored three.js engine - no account, no install, and no scene data leaves your device. For the wider picture, the Space 3D collection also has a Lagrange Points explorer covering the general five-point geometry and an N-Body Sandbox for free-form gravity play.
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