The Implementation of the Facility Responsible Centre Concept for the Space Station in Europe

Abstract

For the utilisation of the Space Station, Europe has opted for a decentralised payload operations approach that will be hinged on the so-called Facility Responsible Centres (FRC). A FRC is a centre responsible for the operation of a multi-user facility hosted on the ESA Columbus Orbiting Facility (COF). ESA is developing a Fluid Science Lab, a Biolab, a Material Science Lab and the European Physiology Module. For all these labs a decentralised user support concept has been reassessed following the outcomes of the late ESA User Support Organisation Study. This concept has been proposed to ESA as baseline for the beginning of the user support activities development in Europe. The objective of this presentation is to introduce this proposal on the operational scenario foreseen for payloads and experiments operations in Europe. MARS, MUSC and CADMOS will represent the FRCs on which this concept will be implemented. In particular, special emphasis will be given to the FRC activities during the facilities development station assembly phase. Facilities ground models utilisation, interfaces set-up with the user community and crew training issues will also be highlighted.