ESA's 35m deep space station at New Norcia ESA transmits first-ever telecommands to Chinese satellite
1 November 2007
For the first time, ESA tracking stations have transmitted telecommands to a Chinese satellite. This morning at 07:15 CET (06:15 UTC), China's mission control reported that commands transmitted from Maspalomas station had been successfully received by the Chang'e-1 Moon mission.
ESA ground tracking support to China's Chang'e-1 successfully started on 1 November 2007 at 04:35 CET (03:35 UTC) with the first receipt of telemetry signals from the Chinese mission at ESA's 35m deep-space station at New Norcia, Australia. ESA ground tracking support to China's Chang'e-1 successfully started on 1 November 2007 at 04:35 CET (03:35 UTC) with the first receipt of telemetry signals from the Chinese mission at ESA's 35m deep-space station at New Norcia, Australia. Two hours and 39 minutes later, the first telecommands to Chang'e-1 were transmitted via ESA's 15m station in Maspalomas, Spain, when the Chinese satellite was nearly 200 000 km from Maspalomas station. An hour later, the ESA station in Kourou, French Guiana, also successfully received telemetry and transmitted commands to Chang'e-1.
Maspalomas station New Norcia, Maspalomas and Kourou stations are part of ESA's ESTRACK ground station network, and are remotely controlled from the European Space Operations Centre (ESOC), in Darmstadt, Germany. The successful communications mark a major milestone as this is the first time a telecommand to a Chinese spacecraft has been transmitted from an ESA station. In addition to receipt of telemetry and transmission of telecommands, the Maspalomas and Kourou stations also performed ranging and Doppler measurements used to determine the spacecraft's location and direction.
"The support began as planned and without any problems. We were confident it would work given the extensive preparations and intensive testing we did in close cooperation with the Chinese," said Erik Soerensen, Head of the System Requirements and Validation Section at ESOC.
Time-line to success
This morning, engineers working in ESOC's ESTRACK Control Centre reported the following series of events (times in CET = UTC+1): 04:35 ESA's 35m New Norcia station successfully acquired Chang'e-1 telemetry 05:15 Beijing Aerospace Control Centre (BACC) successfully connected to New Norcia via ESOC 05:15 BACC reported receipt of good telemetry
Marks the first time that an ESA station has received, processed and routed telemetry signals to a Chinese control centre 05:44 ESA's Maspalomas station successfully acquired Chang'e-1 telemetry signals 06:50 BACC successfully connected to Maspalomas and reported good telemetry 07:04 Maspalomas successfully established the up-link to Chang'e-1 and BACC reported on-board lock 07:14 Telecommands from BACC successfully transmitted from Maspalomas 07:15 BACC reported telecommands successfully received by Chang'e-1
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Radioteleskop o średnicy 100 metrów

1 listopada o godz. 06:04 GMT radioteleskopy należące do sieci śledzenia ESTRACK, Europejskiej Agencji Kosmicznej, po raz pierwszy przekazały radiokomendy do chińskiego orbitera księżycowego, Chang'e 1. Jedenaście minut później, chińskie centrum dowodzenia w Pekinie potwierdziło prawidłowe odebranie komend przez orbiter. Był to pierwszy raz, gdy stacje śledzenia ESA przekazały rozkazy do chińskiego statku kosmicznego. Rozkazy przekazał 15 metrowy radioteleskop w Maspalomas, w Hiszpanii. Chang'e znajdował się wtedy 200 000 km od Ziemi.

Kilka godzin wcześniej, o 04:35 GMT, ESA rozpoczęła wspieranie misji Chang'e 1 swoją siecią łączności. Wtedy to, 35 metrowy radio teleskop w New Norcia, w Australii, odebrał pierwsze dane telemetryczne z chińskiego orbitera i przekazał je do Chin. Następne dane telemetryczne odebrał radioteleskop w Kourou, w Gujanie Francuskiej.

Stacje w Maspalomas i Kourou wykonały także pomiary dopplerowskie pozwalające ustalić odległość i kierunek lotu chińskiej sondy.
  
"''Wsparcie przebiegło zgodnie z planem i bez żadnych problemów. Jesteśmy pewnie, że to zasługa intensywnych przygotowań i testów przeprowadzonych w ścisłej współpracy z Chinami''", powiedział Erik Soerensen, dyrektor sekcji wymogów systemowych i kontroli w Europejskim Centrum Operacji Kosmicznych (ESOC).