High-Level Project Summary
Orbits around Earth allow us to deploy space operations. The increasing space debris orbiting Earth produces potential risk to spacecrafts, international space station, satellites and Earth, and limits our access to space. Addressing space debris is crucial for avoiding the potential risk, and operating debris protection, debris mitigation and debris remediation.In this project, we develop an application to address orbital debris. A 3D animation presenting the location of debris is made. The risk of collision is predicted by marking the debris in red color as warning if a certain satellite is threatened by it. Finally, several future applications are proposed.
Link to Project "Demo"
Link to Final Project
Detailed Project Description
In this project, we develop an application to address orbital debris by using Python. The orbital parameters for the currently tracked debris in Earth orbit are obtained from Space-Track. The two line element data is used to calculate the altitude, longitude and latitude of debris at specific time, then the locations of debris are shown in a 3D animation. Three modes are developed in our program, including “real_time” mode, “given_time” mode and “satellite_protect” mode. The risk of collision is predicted by marking the debris in red color as warning if a certain satellite is threatened by it. Finally, several future applications are proposed.
The three modes provide us to track the orbital debris at specific time, and can predict the possible danger of collision of debris and satellites. In the “real_time” mode, we track the locations of all the currently tracked debris in Earth orbit. In the “given_time” mode, we predict the locations of all the currently tracked debris in Earth orbit at any given time. As the debris enter a chosen region, they are marked in red color, otherwise they are in blue. In the “satellite_protect” mode, the orbital parameters of Hubble Space Telescope (HST) is imported, and the distances between the HST and the debris are calculated. If the distance between the HST and debris is smaller than a certain length, we consider the HST is threatened by the debris, and the debris is marked in red color.
In the future, the prediction technique can be extended to monitor all the other satellites and spaceship, and estimate the risk of collision between them. Besides, if two or more satellites are in the risk of collision, this app can automatically inform the institutes that the satellites belong to, avoiding the waste of resources and unnecessary loss when more and more satellites are in orbits around Earth. Furthermore, we can develop small satellites which can remove the debris from their orbits by using laser pulse or magnetic field. By decreasing the speed of the debris, they will fall into the atmosphere and burn out. If we can accurately predict the location of debris, these small satellites can be launched into the region with high density of debris and clean the orbits around Earth.
Space Agency Data
The orbital parameters for the currently tracked debris in Earth orbit are obtained from Space-Track. The two line element (TLE) data is used to calculate the altitude, longitude and latitude of debris at specific time, then the locations of debris are shown in a 3D animation. The information in Astromaterials Research & Exploration Science Orbital Debris Program Office, such as debris protection, debris mitigation and debris remediation, inspires us to design the future work.
Hackathon Journey
This Hackathon Journey is an exciting process and we have learned a lot from it. In the beginning, we see an email about this activity from our university and think this is interesting. We once chose another challenge, then we changed our challenge to "Mapping Space Trash in Real Time". Although most of us were not familiar with Python language and the two line element data, we keep searching and approaching our problem. After the "real_time" mode is done, we extend the program to predict the locations of debris at any given time. Then, we choose Hubble Space Telescope as an example to show that the debris near a satellite are needed to be concerned.
We have learned how to solve a large problem, which cannot be done by one person. The collaboration is important. We need to have good communications and help everyone in our team to do what they are good at. We also need to help and encourage each other when we are facing problems. Besides, when we think about how to deal with the debris in the future after we can track them, we have many new ideas by sharing our opinions.
We have also learned how to search information. Since we were not familiar with Python language and two line element data, we have to learn in short time. How to search information and learn from it is an important ability for us.
We would like to thank NASA Hackathon and Taiwan leads team provide us this wonderful experience. We also want to thank the experts, who we consult to, in National Space Organization.
References
Space-Track Data Source: https://www.space-track.org/
Skyfield Python Package: https://rhodesmill.org/skyfield/
Astromaterials Research & Exploration Science Orbital Debris Program Office: https://orbitaldebris.jsc.nasa.gov/
Tags
#debris #satellite #spacecraft #space journey
Global Judging
This project has been submitted for consideration during the Judging process.