Columbus Operations – Joint undertaking between DLR and Industry

Columbus operation is a special challenge not only for space vehicle development, but also for deploying new operational concepts for ground support. Due to the long runtime of such a project and the related constraints new approaches are necessary to have the project alive over that long period. One new contractual and technical approach of spacecraft operation and maintenance has now been set up between ESA and the industrial consortium EADS/DLR and other major European industrial partners with regards to the ISS and Columbus program. Together with the expertise in hardware and vehicle design of EADS, DLR, one of Europe’s specialists in the spacecraft operations, forms the backbone of the new operational set up

New Col-CC Operations Concept and New Challenges

On 15 January 2014 the Columbus Flight Control Team implemented the New Operations Concept after a short term preparation phase in the second half of 2013. The new setup consists of two 24/7 positions Col- FD and STRATOS support by several 8/5 positions like COSMO and COMET as well as the Eurocom. This new operations concept has been established in short timeframe in parallel to the ongoing crosscertification of the DMS and Systems team members to STRATOS. Due to the short preparation phase the new setup has to be improved and fine-tuned will already in use together with updating the relevant ops products. It is planned to finalize the transition phase by mid of 2014 which will allow providing a first experience of the new setup. In parallel to these big setup changes of the FCT a lot of challenges are waiting for the team. In January 2014 the next on-board software upgrade – Cycle 14 – has been successfully performed. The preparation for the next increment 39/40 is in full swing especially the preparation for the “Blue Dot” mission of the German ESA astronaut Alexander Gerst. During this mission many new payloads will be brought to the ISS and many experiments will be performed in Columbus

Adapting Columbus Operations and Providing a Basis for Future Endeavours

On 15th December 2015, Timothy Peake – the 4th ESA astronaut in 20 months – headed into orbit for a 6-month stay on the ISS. The British astronaut's "Principia" mission holds many interesting tasks, not only for Tim Peake himself (he performed an EVA on 15th January 2016) but also for the teams on the ground. One of the most exciting activities was the second session of the Airway Monitoring experiment, which again included an experiment run in the US airlock under coordination of the Columbus Control Centre (Col-CC). Besides that, there were many other experiments, such as EML, PK4, DOSIS and Meteron, and also the transition to new NASA tools (e.g. WebAD) was done in this period. Since the establishment of ESA's new setup in July 2015, Col-CC has been working together with all its partners to define the new interfaces, exploit new possibilities, and define in detail the tasks for the operations teams. Besides the ongoing work to monitor and command Columbus, support the ESA experiments on the ISS, as well as supporting the ESA astronaut himself, Col-CC is looking forward towards potential future tasks and challenges. Based on many years of experience in human space flight, an initial study was launched to investigate some of the challenges of human space flight activities beyond Earth orbit. One of these challenges is the delay of communication transmissions experienced over long distances. Until now, all our human space flight operations have been based on (near) real-time communications to monitor and control the spacecraft. This paper describes the results of our study investigating the necessary changes to current operations in the case of long-distance communications. Example procedures are assessed on their reliance on real-time communications and thus how current operations would be impacted by transmission delays. Methods are proposed to make the procedures tolerant to delays, and enable operations to use these procedures for deep space missions

Development and Implementation of a new Columbus Operations Setup

After four years of continuous Columbus operations since February 2008 and the end of the Shuttle era in July 2011 the operations concept of ISS and also Columbus has to be partly reshuffled. Despite the last years when tool upgrades and hardware renewals were in the focus of the team now a reorganization of the Flight Control Team itself has to be started. In parallel to the ongoing operations work which has to ensure a running Columbus module with minimum impact, the FCT has developed a new setup of the on-console and off-console team. This is partly driven by a growing efficiency of the FCT due to their experience on console but mainly to ensure the feasibility and affordability of the project during the long-term operations period until at least 2020. The year 2012 is a pure preparation year laying the basis for the changes to come in the years after. The first implementation of the new setup on console is planned for 2013. Nevertheless the new concept will be full established in 2015, only. Due to the reduced resources foreseen in the new concept there will be a lot of influences on the performance of the flight control team and on how operations is done at Col-CC when the new concept is implemented. Nevertheless the necessary tasks of the Col-CC FCT will be performed during transition and after the final implementation of the concept. Besides this big preparation work to be done in 2012 also the normal operations work has been performed with rack tilting, exchange of hardware, a major software upgrade of the Columbus module and support of the payload operations in Columbus. The paper will give an overview of the achievements and highlights of the last year and concentrate major change in the setup of the Columbus FCT which is one of the preparatory tasks for the planned ISS operations until 2020

Changes in Columbus Operations and Outlook to Long-term Operation Phase

Since the activation of Columbus on 12 February 2008 three years of busy and partly challenging operation have been performed by the Columbus FCT. The last year was mainly driven by the ground segment schedule to update the control rooms and servers to adapt the ground systems with software and hardware development. Starting with the control room K3 new workstations, new monitoring and command software as well as a new Voice Communication System (VoCS) have been installed, tested and brought into operations. Meanwhile also K4, the main control room at Col-CC, is completely renewed and used for operations. The last step to follow is the update of the backup control room K11 which has been performed for February/March 2011. Besides the scheduling of the ground events around the most important activities on board, the proficiency training of the FCT was a major challenge of the Columbus flight control team. For the first time the flight controllers have to be trained on a completely new system, i.e. the VoCS, during ongoing operations with all constraints due to shift plan and operation preparation work. This experience will be used for the training for future add-ons, changes and upgrades as well as for the setup of continuous proficiency training for upcoming years. Despite the quite low attrition rate in the Flight Control Team at Col-CC a continuous replacement of flight controllers takes place. The training for the new flight controller is well established and continuously adapted to the current needs. Nevertheless the knowledge of the long-term flight controllers has to be kept on the current level of experience and the way how operation is done. Hence a knowledge database has to be set up for use by the flight controllers and as a basis for the establishment and extension of the proficiency training of the FCT (see [10]). During the ULF5 (STS-133) flight in February 2011 the WOOV8 valve of the Columbus Thermal Control System is the next major challenge of the Col-FCT, because this the first major on-orbit maintenance of the Columbus TCU including a necessary rack tilting. The paper will give an overview of the achievements and highlights of the last year and concentrate further on the operational goals and constraints of the next years as well as the first preparations on the planned ISS operations until 2020

Highlights in Columbus Operations and Preparation for Assembly Complete Operations Phase

Since the activation of Columbus on 12 February 2008 two and a half years of busy and partly challenging operation have been performed by the Columbus FCT. With a total of 9 experiment racks, 1 external payload and several stand-alone experiments situated in Columbus the Columbus Flight Control Team is very busy to prepare and execute operations in the European module, taking into account the larger workforce onboard ISS since the permanent 6 person crew has been established in May 2009. The major challenges of the third year of Columbus operations was the maintenance of the WOOV8 valve of the Thermal Control System by a combined crew/ground activity including a necessary rack tilting and the recovery of a Columbus Onboard DMS problem with some ripple effects on operations. The preparation work concentrated on new ESA experiments like the 5th ESA rack called MARES delivered with Shuttle flight 19A (STS-131) and the Vessel-ID payload delivered in spring 2010.The MARES rack is installed in F3 location in Columbus during 19A flight and a first short commission is planned in ULF4 stage. The major commissioning is foreseen for Increment 25&26 starting in October 2010, which needs to be prepared by the responsible USOC – CADMOS – together with the Col-OCs. After the retirement of the Shuttle in autumn 2010 the possibilities to transport defect parts to earth and spare parts to orbit will vanish or reduced, respectively. Hence the maintenance approach of Columbus after Assembly Complete of the ISS in 2010 has to be adapted to allow smooth operations and to ensure full support of the Columbus system for payload operations to fulfill the science objectives of the European module

Analysis of Operational Scenarios for Moon Related Space Flight Activities

Sending astronauts to and from the Moon is a special challenge not only for space vehicle development but also for the production of new operational concepts for ground support. The Columbus module, the first European manned spacecraft to be monitored and controlled in orbit for a lengthy period of time, clearly demonstrates the necessity for a control centre. The complexity of a space station does not allow the astronaut to be an expert of everything residing on the station. As such, specific expertise and operational support from the ground is needed. In case of an exploration of the Moon from a permanent Moon base, the complexity is expected to be even higher. Particularly the higher and more elaborate transportation needs and the harsh environment of the Moon offer additional challenges compared to the ISS

One year of Columbus Operations and First Experience with 6 Persons Crew

On 12 February 2009 the first year of operation of the Columbus Module was passed. These 12 months of Columbus in orbit have shown a lot of successes of the whole Columbus operation teams but also has shown some open topics which have already been addressed to ensure a long-term operation of Columbus. In the first year 4 NASA racks were successfully relocated from Destiny module to the Columbus, reactivated and used by NASA for various experiments with support from Col-CC and other European centres. The first Columbus software transition in space from Cycle 10 to Cycle 11 to be compatible with the NASA R7 software upgrade has been performed smoothly in August 2008. Many European experiments performed by the USOCs like WAICOI (in the Biolab rack), Geoflow (in the FSL rack) and SOLO (using European, US and Russian assets) have been successfully supported by Columbus Flight Control Team (Col-FCT)

Das Columbus-Kontrollzentrum in Oberpfaffenhofen

Seit 1983 ist das deutsche Raumfahrtkontrollzentrum (German Space Operations Center, GSOC) in Oberpfaffenhofen aktiv an einer langen Reihe von amerikanischen und russischen bemannten Raumfahrtmissionen beteiligt. Basierend auf diesen Erfahrungen wurde DLR/GSOC 1998 von der ESA beauftragt, das Columbus Kontrollzentrum (Col-CC) aufzubauen. Parallel zum Aufbau der Infrastruktur wurde auch ein integriertes Flight Control Team am Col-CC zusammengestellt, das sich aus Mitgliedern von DLR und Industrie zusammensetzt. Das Columbus Kontrollzentrum wurde im Oktober 2004 offiziell eingeweiht und wird Mitte 2006 formal qualifiziert. Der erste operationelle Einsatz des Col-CC war die Eneide-Mission mit dem italienischen Astronauten R. Vittori, der im April 2005 mit der russischen Sojus-Kapsel zur ISS flog. Während der nun folgenden Nutzungsphasen der ISS bis zum Start von Columbus wird das Col-CC den Betrieb der europäischen Experimente auf dem merikanischen und russischen Teil der Raumstation betreuen und gleichzeitig sich auf den Columbus-Betrieb vorbereiten. Die Veröffentlichung beschreibt die Einbettung des Col-CC in das ISS-Umfeld, die eingesetzten Subsysteme im Col-CC, das geplante Konzept für den Columbus-Betrieb sowie die bisher gemachten Erfahrungen

Consolidating Columbus Operations and Looking for new Frontiers

In January 2014, the Columbus Flight Control Team (FCT) started with a modified real-time operations scenario. Since then the 24/7 shift coverage was reduced to the Col-Flight Director and the STRATOS position. The whole year of 2014, and also partly 2015, was needed to consolidate the new set-up, with its new and profound constraints, to find workarounds for special operational cases, to finalize operational product adaptations, but also to reduce the workload of the Columbus Flight Control team taking into account the reduced resources. Nonetheless, it is clear that the Col-FCT is at the limit of their capabilities, especially during high activity phases. The consolidation phase was necessary due to the short preparation and implementation phase in late 2013 and early 2014. In parallel, the Columbus Execute Level Planning team was merged with the Operations Coordinator team