Managing the Operational Risks of Small Satellite Missions

Abstract

The preparation and execution of small satellite mission operations is always a trade-off between effort and risk. To face this trade-off an innovative multi-mission concept was successfully deployed at DLR’s German Space Operations Center (GSOC) for its satellite missions during the last years. GSOC pursues the objective with every new mission irrespectively of its nature to contribute to more modern, more secure and more effective ways of mission operations. The missions CHAMP and GRACE, currently operated by GSOC, and TerraSAR-X which is under preparation, are identified in this paper. The chosen approach for those missions facilitates the qualification and validation of elements already used for other missions as well as the integration-, testand validation process. The resource sharing and schedule coordination between different missions is also addressed, including interoperability and cross-support. The beneficial synergies created by this integrated approach when applied to GSOC-external cooperation with customer, scientific or commercial user, payload provider and the spacecraft manufacturer are shown. The involvement of control center staff in spacecraft tests leads to positive results regarding tests, processes, procedures, documents, databases and products. This concept uses integrated operations teams which consist of technical and management experts from all involved parties under operations management by GSOC, however, with key functions distributed among the partners according to the expertise available. Low budget small satellite missions can reduce financial aspects and operational risks by being embedded in a multi-mission environment. Figure 1: GSOC 55th International Astronautical Congress 2004 Vancouver, Canada