Standards Development

Scope

The Manoeuvre Coordination Message standard is applicable to satellite operations in all environments in which close approaches and collision events amongst satellites may occur. The standard contains a message designed for applications involving conjunctions and manoeuvre information interchange between active satellite owners/operators, as well as manoeuvre recommendations between both originators and recipients involved in conjunction events. The MCM is conceived to be generated for conjunction events between active or inactive spacecraft, that would be considered of high risk for at least one of the objects involved.

Manoeuvre coordination and recommendation information should include data types such as the relative geometry and probability of collision at the Time of Closest Approach (TCA), which refer to a conjunction product, the Conjunction Data Message (CDM). These parameters can be either specified directly in the MCM or could be obtained through a linked CDM. Additionally, it contains information on the manoeuvre capabilities of each spacecraft as well as a reference to planned mitigation actions (if any). The attributes of a MCM make it suitable for automation of the coordination process. The MCM standard only applies to the message format, structure and content. The exchange method is beyond the scope of the standard, and it is due to be specified in an ICD. The methods used to produce the data in the message are also beyond the scope of the standard. The rules of negotiation started after reception of the MCM are also beyond the scope of the standard, and should be included in other documents specifically intended for that purpose. The MCM is intended for a single data message, however several MCMs may be generated and exchanged during the coordination process for a conjunction event. Systems processing sequences of MCMs, possibly from different originators, need to handle the information properly.

Purpose

The Manoeuvre Coordination Message (MCM) is a standard message format to be used in coordinating mitigation actions to conjunction events for satellite owners/operators and other authorized parties. These messages can provide manoeuvre information updates and manoeuvre recommendations to spacecraft owners/operators.

The MCM exchanges shall be used to provide data related to the spacecraft manoeuvre capabilities to enable coordination when mitigating conjunction events. The MCM standard will: 

a) Facilitate the automation for the collision avoidance mitigation processes;

b) Exchange the essential information needed to coordinate a conjunction event. It shall include the manoeuvre capabilities between the owner/operators, and the confirmation on the manoeuvering intentions of each of the involved satellite owners/operators;

c) Enable the communication of collision avoidance manoeuvre (CAM) recommendations from collision avoidance service providers coordinators to the owners/operators (O/O) of satellites involved in conjunction events;

d) Extend the possibilities of the existing formats to communicate CAM recommendations for missing technologies/techniques: continuous thrust, drag augmentation, Electric Orbit Raising (EOR) boost stops (if needed);

e) Exchange input information to the coordination software (SW) models to ease cross-validation activities; and

f) Exchange meaningful output information from the coordination SW models to the end-users, increasing transparency and transferring valuable data for decision-making processes.