Space Situational Awareness (SSA)

The start of the Multiannual Financial Framework 2021-2027 of the European Union means at the same time the start of the new 'Space Programme of the European Union', also termed 'EU Space Programme'. It is composed of different elements, one of which is the 'Space Situational Awareness' (SSA) element. 'SSA' is a world-wide known concept that covers the monitoring, understanding and possibly predicting of those aspects of the space environment that pose a potential threat to space and ground assets, and to humans.

We distinguish between three types of threats:

Space Weather (SWE)

Threat of an impact of radiation and high energetic particles coming from the Sun on technological systems and on humans.

Near Earth Objects (NEO)

Threat of a collision of asteroids with the Earth.

Space Surveillance and tracking (SST)

Threat of collisions of satellites with other satellites and with space debris.

The EU SSA Programme is complementary to the ESA Space Safety Programme.