CONJUNCTION ASSESSMENT FOR THE MAGNETOSPHERIC MULTI-SCALE (MMS) FORMATION

The highly elliptical orbit of the MMS formation-flying mission presents a unique conjunction assessment environment. The MMS spacecraft will spend part of its highly elliptical orbit in a debris-free environment at apogee then transition through densely populated regions in the geosynchronous belt and in low earth orbit (LEO) near orbit perigee. An analysis was performed to characterize the debris environment that MMS will encounter and estimate the number of Risk Mitigation Maneuvers (RMM) that could potentially be required over the mission lifetime. Additionally, an assessment of the GSFC Conjunction Assessment (CA) tool suite was performed to determine its applicability for performing conjunction assessment for the MMS mission.