by Tracy Chamberlin

The skies overhead are looking more and more like rush hour traffic in a large city – without the roads.

 

The Department of Physics and Engineering at Fort Lewis College is helping to navigate that terrain as one of five Colorado schools taking part in the Falcon Telescope Network, a research and development project helping to track space junk.

 

“It’s not traffic control, it’s just figuring out … how many cars are up there,” said Ryan Haaland, chair of the department.

 

Six small telescopes, including one in Chile, will observe the sun’s reflection on passing satellites, and collect data used to identify some of the 500,000 objects floating in a labyrinth of debris around the planet.

 

According to the National Aeronautics and Space Administration, most of the debris is nonoperational, parts of space vehicles abandoned after launch or other mission-related materials. But it can all travel at speeds up to 17,500 mph, and even flecks of paint have damaged the windows on the space shuttle at that velocity.

 

“Simply knowing what’s up there, where it is and where it will be tomorrow is a fairly important thing,” Haaland said.
Several programs exist to track debris using radar and optical systems; however, the Falcon Telescope Network will use a newer technique, the light fingerprint.

 

Dimensions and characteristics of an orbiting satellite can be calculated from the unique reflections of sunlight it generates. That fingerprint improves space situational awareness along with a host of other potential applications.

 

Cadets at the U.S. Air Force Academy will add to the collected data by building micro-satellites as a part of their education and those satellites will be launched into the orbital fray.

 

The specific measurements taken on the ground combined with the light fingerprint observations will give researchers a more complete picture, helping to test and adjust calculations used to catalogue the objects.

 

“It provides the Air Force Academy, Air Force and Department of Defense with a unique capability that is essentially nonexistent,” a report from the Air Force Academy stated.

 

This helps protect human spacecraft, like the International Space Station, and operational satellites, like the ones sending GPS directions to cars or primetime TV to the satellite dish.

 

This remotely controlled and fully autonomous network involves five colleges across the state: The Air Force Academy, the lead school in the project; Colorado Mesa University in Grand Junction; Northeast Junior College in Sterling; Otero Junior College in La Junta; and Fort Lewis.

 

A sixth telescope will be housed at the municipal Mamalluca Observatory in Vicuna, Chile, because of its longitudinal position.

 

Fort Lewis was chosen for the project for two reasons: it completes the grid across Colorado and offers darker skies.

 

Haaland is currently looking for a location for the FLC telescope, which is scheduled to arrive before the end of the year. He would prefer to have it on college property, but a need to avoid lights will be the overriding factor.

 

Construction is slated for the first of the year, and “First Light,” when the champagne hits the hull, will be June 2012.

 

“It’s happening very quickly,” Haaland said.
The Air Force Academy, funded by an almost $800,000 grant, acquired the 20-inch telescopes from RC Optical Systems and kept costs down by choosing commercially available equipment.

 

Identical 12-foot clamshell dome housings, control systems, monitors and software will also be used at each site making communications and operations smoother, another benefit of commercial products.

 

The telescope is ideal for observing small objects in low-Earth orbit with the ability to track debris as small as 10 centimeters. Objects of this size do not make good candidates for pictures but great candidates for the light fingerprint technique.

 

Beyond preventing fender benders in space, the project leaves each of these schools with free time on the telescope. The network collects data just after dusk and just before dawn, which leaves most of the night open to traditional astronomy, and student and faculty research.  

 

Haaland considers this an opportunity.

 

His students get exposed to applied research, which can give them a better chance at finding work after school, and the department gets a chance to nurture its relationship with the community.

 

“Space has always been an eye-opening experience for many children,” he said, referring to the possibility of interacting with local elementary, middle or high schools. “It sets their sights bigger than planet Earth.”

 

Of the 1,000 satellites currently orbiting the Earth, 500 are considered U.S. assets. One of those, an Iridium Communications satellite, collided with a Russian Cosmo on Feb. 10, 2009. Two years earlier, China tested an anti-satellite weapon.

 

Events like these inspired the Air Force and U.S. to consider space situational awareness an important aspect of U.S. security.

 

“We’ve been launching stuff up into orbit since the 1960s,” Haaland said. “Not really paying attention to the problem (that) this stuff stays up there awhile.”

 

And the traffic keeps getting heavier. NASA sent up an NPP spacecraft this past week as part of a system “that will collect data on both long-term climate change and short-term weather conditions,” according to the NASA website.

 

Each year, the demand for information goes up as often as the next satellite, creating opportunities for schools like Fort Lewis to help keep an eye on the sky.