Test Campaign of the Optimized Maintenance and Survey Tasking (OMST) Strategy with Multiple Telescope Stations

Abstract

The Optimized Maintenance and Survey Tasking (OMST) strategy has been previously introduced as a sensor tasking strategy optimizing the maximal amount of pre-catalogued resident space objects (RSO) detected in a given observation window. Test campaigns with a single telescope station of the German Space Operations Center (GSOC) at the German Aerospace Center (DLR) within the SMARTnet telescope network had been performed successfully and published. In the results shown in this paper, the versatility and benefits of the tasking strategy are shown utilizing the combined sensor network of GSOC’s third telescope station deployed in Chile, together with the stations already operational in Australia and South Africa, and with the Purdue Optical Ground Station (POGS) on the northern hemisphere. The results show that even in the absence of communication between the sensors and any sensor feedback through processing, the combined tasking provides significant benefits over independent tasking. We show results of a dedicated test campaign within a specified time interval, where schedules are created with the most recent base catalogue on these days and distributed to the individual telescope stations. Observations are acquired automatically and analyzed at GSOC and Purdue University, in terms of tracking performance. For comparison, the campaign is accompanied with observations of these stations without dedicated and coordinated tasking, where each station is observing the same base catalogue individually without knowledge of the other ones. We will present the results of the test campaigns, compare the two test campaigns, and draw conclusions towards potential for improvements.