Articolo in rivista, 2022, ENG, 10.1016/j.actaastro.2022.05.045
Pardini C.; Anselmo L.
CNR-ISTI, Pisa, Italy; CNR-ISTI, Pisa, Italy
In this paper we introduce a new index for evaluating the likelihood of accidental collisions leading to the complete destruction of intact objects in a volume of space in low Earth orbit (LEO). The proposed index is therefore not intended to assess the criticality of individual objects or missions, but rather to estimate the global impact of space activities on a given region of space. Moreover, the new index has been designed to be objective, as simple as possible, built from easily accessible data, as well as smoothly reproducible by third parties. Named "volumetric collision rate index", it has been developed starting from analytical equations expressing the collision rate as a function of the fluxes of intact objects and cataloged debris pieces. The application of reasonable simplifying assumptions and approximations has finally made it possible to define a dimensionless index that explicitly depends only on the spatial densities of intact objects and cataloged debris pieces. It has therefore been applied to the LEO environment, analyzing its evolution from mid-2008 to mid-2020, a crucial period characterized by an impressive change of space activity patterns, with the launch of lots of small satellites and mega-constellations. We also discuss how the index can be further improved, taking into account the maneuverable satellites, which do not contribute to the collision rate, and the increasing number of cubesats, which in many respects are more similar to debris, finally presenting a preliminary analysis in this direction.
Acta astronautica 198 , pp. 756–760
Space debris, Cataloged objects, Environmental criticality indexes, Catastrophic collision rate
Pardini Carmen, Anselmo Luciano
ISTI – Istituto di scienza e tecnologie dell'informazione "Alessandro Faedo"
ID: 470382
Year: 2022
Type: Articolo in rivista
Creation: 2022-09-02 10:49:34.000
Last update: 2022-09-02 15:53:32.000
CNR authors
External links
OAI-PMH: Dublin Core
OAI-PMH: Mods
OAI-PMH: RDF
DOI: 10.1016/j.actaastro.2022.05.045
URL: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0094576522002648
External IDs
CNR OAI-PMH: oai:it.cnr:prodotti:470382
DOI: 10.1016/j.actaastro.2022.05.045
Scopus: 2-s2.0-85131407509
ISI Web of Science (WOS): 000829100500005