ESA opens new facility to protect Earth from risky asteroids and space debris

The European Space Agency (ESA) on Tuesday opened the Space Safety Centre, a new dedicated facility for activities protecting Earth from a raging star, risky asteroids and space debris.

The Centre was inaugurated by ESA Director General Josef Aschbacher and Director Rolf Densing at the ESA's ESOC mission control centre, in Darmstadt, Germany.

"A major space weather event could cause in excess of €15 billion damage in Europe. We cannot prevent space weather, but costly ground infrastructure and satellites – and the critical services they provide – can be protected through forecasts, timely warnings and real-time information," said Rolf Densing, ESA's Director of Operations.

ESA said that the new facility provides a dynamic environment where next-generation space-weather capabilities, tools and models will be developed, tested and evaluated in close cooperation with European institutes and industry.

The Space Safety Centre will work in close coordination with ESA's Space Weather Services Network to provide timely and reliable space weather information to European spacecraft operators, agencies, institutions, researchers and commercial sectors affected by solar activity including transportation, navigation and power grid operators.

"This new ESA facility demonstrates the ambition of Europe to have its critical missions in orbit and civil infrastructure on ground well protected against hazards from space," said ESA Director General Josef Aschbacher.

In future, the new facility will also be used to monitor the utilisation of data acquired by the agency's three upcoming space safety missions. These include:

• ESA Vigil, the first of its kind mission to monitor the active and unpredictable Sun
• Europe's flagship Planetary Defender 'Hera'
• ClearSpace-1, the first mission to remove a piece of space debris from orbit

Teams will use the Centre to monitor data from ESA's #SpaceWeather sensors in orbit and future missions such as #ESAVigil.By providing the latest info on solar activity, our teams help keep spacecraft, astronauts, power grids & more safe from our star's unpredictable outbursts. pic.twitter.com/t4jIFmSAfF

— ESA Operations (@esaoperations) April 12, 2022