Reducing the Vulnarability of Space Systems to Small Debris Particles

The European funded FP7 project, ReVuS, aims to define design solutions that will reduce the vulnerability of future low Earth orbit (LEO) satellites to the small- and medium-sized debris. An assessment of the vulnerability of two representative LEO satellites to these debris has allowed to evaluate the failure probability for the entire satellite, and to identify the critical areas and equipment on the satellites. It appears that the most significant contribution to this probability of failure comes from the debris in the range 2 to 5mm. Potential solutions to minimise the vulnerability of the satellite have been identified, both at system and architecture levels. The use of shielding protection is one of the main solutions, to protect the critical equipment, possibly the critical areas. Shielding configurations are based on shielding bricks. Tests have been performed to evaluate the characteristics of these shielding bricks and the performances of a set of shielding configurations. An assessment of the proposed solutions is on-going, to evaluate the gain in terms of vulnerability and the impacts on the satellite.