Agile Space Infrastructure for Rapid Disaster Response

PECRE Award Holder: Ciara McGrath, University of Strathclyde

Exchange Host: Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), USA

Tropical storms are powerful weather systems that cause billions of pounds of damage each year. One of the most recent devastating storms was Hurricane Dorian, which struck the Bahamas in September 2019. According to the National Emergency Management Agency (NEMA), 50 people died in the Bahamas due to Hurricane Dorian and over 1300 people were still missing in mid- September 2019. Remote sensing data from satellites provides vital information for emergency response, disaster relief, and resilience efforts. Regrettably, satellites are not always in a position to capture areas of interest, which can result in poor-quality, inconsistent, or even no data at critical times.

Manoeuvrable, agile spacecraft could be used to provide responsive, on-demand coverage of time-critical events such as tropical storms. Efficient propulsion systems developed at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) could enable such agile space infrastructure in the very near future. These spacecraft could be used to perform coordinated flyovers of a moving target, such as a tropical storm, improving the quality and quantity of data collected. However, such a system is complex to both design and operate.

At the University of Strathclyde, we have developed a method of rapid manoeuvre planning that can be used to ensure efficient operation of the spacecraft constellation. Simultaneously, MIT have developed methods of responsive constellation design that minimise the number of spacecraft needed and maximise the performance of the individual spacecraft.

With the support of the SRPe, we will work alongside MIT to develop a comprehensive method of responsive constellation design and operation. By combining our expertise, we aim to provide a constellation blueprint to inform governments of the most efficient design of such a system, and compare the desired performance with the expected system cost. This will be the first step towards developing an agile space infrastructure for rapid disaster response.