Optical Co-Orbital Measurements in Low Earth Orbit

Abstract

The increasing access to the space domain has led to the growth of the on-orbit object population, as well as the evolution of space surveillance capabilities. With the increased public attention paid to spacecraft proximity and rendezvous operations, is an opportunity to examine what and how current space surveillance capabilities can contribute to this field. This thesis examines the feasibility and challenges associated with re-purposing an existing on-orbit space surveillance capability, the NEOSSat microsatellite, to perform proximity operations. The ability of NEOSSat to collect a sufficient number of accurate optical observations to determine the relative orbit of a target spacecraft is explored. A variety of observation events are explored with a collection of spacecraft to generate relative orbits using inertial orbit determination techniques. These practical results, to the author's knowledge, are the first in the field of relative orbit determination using inertial techniques between two co-orbital Low Earth Orbit satellites. iii iv List of Tables x List of Figures xi List of Accronyms xv Chapter 1 Chapter 6 Conclusion 113