FROM VAX TO IPHONE: 20 YEARS OF CLUSTER MISSION GROUND SEGMENT EVOLUTION

摘要

Cluster is a multi-spacecraft ESA mission launched in 2000 to study the Earth's magnetic environment. Theground segment was designed in the early 1990s and has undergone a large number of upgrades in 2006 to preparefor the second mission extension. In the last years a significant orbit change and the degradation of the spacecraftbatteries and solar arrays have dramatically increased operations complexity. A mission extension up to 2014 hasprompted further updates of the ground segment to handle the new scenarios within the mission budget. The toolsand technologies implemented in the areas of ground segment automation, data access and mission planning are thesubject of this paper. The ground automation system routinely used for critical eclipse operations without batteries; aparameter archive tool that allows an easy and quick access to any spacecraft parameter; Cluster Web, a set of webtools internally developed by the Cluster team offering a visual overview of the mission plan and an elegant interfaceto implement conflict-free changes; and iCluster, an iPhone application which allows on-call engineers to accessCluster operational procedures and telemetry in real time are presented. The goal is to illustrate how applyingmodern technologies can help to overcome the natural limitations of an old ground segment and to deal with the newchallenges that arise when missions go far beyond their design lifetime.