Intensive Care for Premature Satellites

Abstract

The German Space Operations Center (GSOC) as part of the German Aerospace Center (DLR) gained a lot of experience with projects requiring an iterative ground segment development and operations approach. Typical challenges are a series of software uploads, flexible commanding, tests on short notice and completing the workflow implementation and documentation during operations. Validated flight procedures and operation rules are established in parallel to prepare for further tests and routine operations. This paper presents the GSOC experience on how to handle these challenges based on the small satellite mission Firebird. If the control center can only partially prepare for the Launch and Early Orbit Phase (LEOP), Commissioning and Routine operations, many tasks of these phases are shifted to after launch. It is then crucial to adapt the operations plan and choose an agile development approach to succeed in the mission. Control centers have standards for management, quality assurance and operation processes either from in-house or derived from standards like the European Cooperation for Space Standardization (ECSS). But there is a high risk of failure when trying to apply the same standards and rules to a project like Firebird. Therefore, rethinking and new development approaches are required to maintain safe, effective and efficient satellite operations. Supporting these kinds of projects from an operations point of view is a phenomenon which is becoming increasingly common. Limited resources for satellite manufacturing, more requirements to fulfill, technical challenges to overcome and tight schedules to make are reasons for this trend. The paper presents lessons learned at GSOC to turn these types of missions into a success, in particular by diminishing the possible negative effects on mission operations during the early stages of such a project.