Article Posted on : - Sep 10, 2010

ESA plans to make Proba-3 the first mission of this kind. Photo by ESA

PARIS (BNS): A new simulator has been developed to help overcome the difficulties of flying multiple satellites together in formation.

The new software test bed is allowing ESA and industrial teams to get to grips with multiple-satellite missions to come, starting with Proba-3, the European space agency said.

The Formation Flying Test Bed is a suite of software running across linked computers to simulate all aspects of a formation-flying mission.

Overseen by ESA’s Software Systems division at the agency’s ESTEC space research and technology centre in the Netherlands, this new facility can emulate the running of more than a single satellite at once.

“It is a generic simulator for formation-flying missions, whether they include two spacecraft or as many as five or six,” said Raffaella Franco of ESA’s System Modelling and Verification section.

“…the Formation Flying Test Bed allows the distribution of software across multiple computers without affecting the user experience,” she said.

The test bed will be used to address the crucial operational factors for formation flying, including mission and vehicle management, guidance navigation, dealing with faults and communicating between satellites.

For the test bed development a demonstration model was established by Belgium’s Spacebel, based on Proba-3, ESA’s first formation flying mission, due for launch in 2014–15.