| | ESTRACK Control Centre
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ESTRACK stations are controlled remotely from the ESTRACK Control Centre (ECC) at ESOC, staffed 24 hours per day. The ECC forms an integral part of ESA's Operations Control Centre (OCC) - the heart of the agency's mission control activities.
Operators in ESOC's ECC monitor the status of the equipment at all ESTRACK ground stations 24 hours/day, 7 days/week; they can also quickly reconfigure any of the stations to provide support to a particular spacecraft via a set of predefined commands.
As part of ESTRACK, the ECC provides over 44 000 hours per year of tracking control and planning services, supporting a dozen ESA and external missions.
 | | | Engineer at work in the ESTRACK Control Centre |
During critical operations such as the Launch and Early Orbit Phase (LEOP), manoeuvres, fly-bys, swing-bys and landings, the relevant ground station(s) involved is/are staffed, and the ECC itself is in full-time voice communications with the mission controllers in ESOC's Main Control Room (MCR).
At these times, ECC operators are directly managed by the Ground Operations Manager, who also occupies a console in the MCR as part of the Mission Control Team.
For a virtual ECC visit, click on the 'ESOC Virtual Tour' image below; once the animation downloads, click on the "Ground Operations Manager" at the left-hand edge of the Main Control Room graphic.
Training, simulations
In addition to managing ongoing real-time mission support in the ECC, experts also provide training and simulations to other personnel operating individual spacecraft and preparing for upcoming manoeuvres or flight procedures.
Training includes specific elements of the ground segment, and includes various simulation campaigns for flight control teams. A mission-dedicated Simulations Officer conducts such simulations, for example, prior to launches.
In a simulation, the Simulations Officer and the (usually) newly composed Flight Control Team together go through operations of a particular spacecraft under nominal and non-nominal conditions during various mission phases. Team training is a key element of the pre-launch campaign.
Operations during critical post-launch mission phases are also preceded by a corresponding simulations campaign. A significant tool for this service is the mission-specific spacecraft simulator.
Last update: 17 August 2009 | |
