Numerica to assist UK Space Agency with space junk tracking

FORT COLLINS — Numerica Corp., the mathematics based aerospace and defense company with its headquarters in Fort Collins, has agreed to work with the United Kingdom Space Agency in its effort to identify and track space junk that could damage satellite operations.

According to a blog post, Numerica said that “orbital congestion and space debris remain one of the biggest global challenges facing the space sector. There are an estimated 900,000 pieces of space debris, including old satellites, spent rocket bodies and even tools from astronaut missions orbiting Earth. Space debris can stay in orbit for hundreds of years and present a real danger to the rapidly increasing number of new satellites being launched each year.” 

Numerica operates a global telescope network of more than 20 sites to help protect government and commercial satellites from on-orbit hazards and threats, the blog said. Through this partnership with the U.K. Space Agency, Numerica will provide space surveillance tracking data.

“High-quality observations produced by the Numerica Telescope Network on behalf of the UK Space Agency will enable enhanced space domain awareness of UK-licensed satellites in deep-space including GEO, medium earth orbits (MEO) and highly elliptical orbits (HEO). This data will provide the UK Space Agency with advanced space object tracking to better estimate the position, velocity, and trajectory of satellites to mitigate the risk of collision with other space objects,” according to the post.

“Numerica is thrilled to support the UK Space Agency with its mission of space sustainability through the use of innovative satellite tracking capabilities,” said Jeff Aristoff, vice president of space systems at Numerica. “We developed the Numerica Telescope Network for operations just like this to help prevent collisions in space and to keep watch over this increasingly important domain.”

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