Daylight laser ranging of space debris with a geodetic laser from the Swiss Optical Ground Station and Geodynamics Observatory Zimmerwald: first experiences.

Rodriguez-Villamizar, Julian; Schildknecht, Thomas (April 2021). Daylight laser ranging of space debris with a geodetic laser from the Swiss Optical Ground Station and Geodynamics Observatory Zimmerwald: first experiences. In: 8th European Conference on Space Debris. Darmstadt, Deutschland. 20. April 2021 - 23. April 2021.

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The Swiss Optical Ground Station and Geodynamics Ob-servatory Zimmerwald (SwissOGS), operated by the Uni-versity of Bern, Switzerland, has extended its capabilitiesfor enabling laser ranging measurements to space debris.Starting in 2012, the SwissOGS successfully participatedin multistatic experiments with other European partnersas a passive receiver of the diffusely reflected photonsfor a decommissioned satellite and a spent upper stage.Next, in 2016 laser ranges gathered for the decommis-sioned satellite ENVISAT were processed and analysedin order to understand and derive an attitude model andits evolution with respect to time.Recent developments in hardware include the use of atracking camera, for correcting the pointing of the tele-scope in real time, when using ephemerides with compro-mised accuracy. In particular for daylight observations,the tracking camera is equipped with additional spectralfilters to block radiation coming from the background,in particular from the diffusely scattered solar photonsand from the backscattered photons of the emitted laserpulses. The implementation of an iris on the focal planeof the receiver path allows to reduce the field of view upto a minimum of 10 arcseconds. Furthermore, a combina-tion of a Fabry-P ́erot and a narrowband filter is inserted inthe optical path of the receiver to ensure that only photonsin the narrow ranges of 532±0.15 and 1064±0.15 nmwavelengths, centered on the wavelengths of our laser,may pass onto the receiver.The software used to control all laser observationswas adapted to include a new group of targets namelyspace debris. Since the initial software design wasdone to comply with precise geodetic standards, weneeded to extend certain modules in the digital real-timefilter, to discriminate actual photons backscatterd by thetarget object from the background. Moreover, we did acareful selection of potential targets according to the min-imum observable optical cross section as a function ofaltitude, minimum expected return flux on the receiver,attitude and reflectivity of the surfaces of the target.We will present our very first experiences in the obser-vation of space debris using a low-power geodetic laser,highlighting the successful observations from passes during daytime.

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