Flight dynamics and mission planning for Sentinel-3 satellite

GMV has been awarded a contract for the development of the Flight Dynamics Facility for Sentinel-3 to provide the required functionality to perform orbit and attitude monitoring, control and prediction activities. The Sentinel-3 satellite, to be operated by EUMETAT and scheduled for launch in 2013, is the third in a series of five space missions being carried out by the European Space Agency (ESA) for the Global Monitoring for Environment and Security (GMES) initiative. The mission’s main objective is to determine the parameters of sea surface topography, sea and land surface temperature as well as ocean and land surface colour. The implementation of this flight dynamics system will be performed on the basis of the one previously developed for the Metop satellites (EPS FDF), also supplied by GMV to EUMETSAT and operational since 2006. New developments for the telecommand generation, sensor and actuator monitoring and interfaces with other facilities in the control centre will be implemented in the scope of this new project.

This system is the third facility for the GMES Sentinel-3 ground segment to be developed by GMV, after the Mission Control System and the Mission Planning Facility. In relation to mission planning, EUMETSAT hosted the Software Requirements Review meeting for the Sentinel-3 Mission Planning Facility. The Sentinel-3 Mission Planning Facility is a Delta development based on the EPS Mission Planning Facility, also developed by GMV, up and running at EUMETSAT since 2006. This meeting was followed by an evaluation from the Review Board and Steering Committee, concluding that the work performed so far by GMV fulfilled the review objectives. In the final report both EUMETSAT and ESA stressed the quality coverage of system requirements. After successfully passing this important milestone GMV has now embarked on the design phase.