Neuraspace installs its second optical telescope for global satellite tracking coverage

Portuguese aerospace company Neuraspace, one of the world leaders in Space Traffic Management (STM), has announced the installation and activation of its second optical telescope. The new telescope is located in Chile and expands coverage over the southern hemisphere. Together with its first telescope, installed at the Beja air base in Portugal, the company can now provide satellite tracking coverage over both hemispheres through its own telescopes, in addition to global data obtained from partner networks.

As a result of their ability to exceed the acquisition rate of one image per second for low orbits, and by enabling the tracking of objects down to 10 cm in diameter, the two telescopes are among the most advanced in the world for the acquisition of astrometric and photometric data for low Earth orbit (LEO). This reduces the uncertainty level for positional errors to less than 100 meters within one orbital revolution as set out in the ESA Space Debris Mitigation Requirement in 2023.

In addition, they support highly agile horizon-to-horizon multi-orbit tracking to quickly switch between targets, producing measurements over a passage of a few seconds to tens of minutes, enabling scalable acquisition of data suitable for multiple purposes such as collision avoidance, debris tracking, pattern-of-life analysis, and launch and early orbit phase (LEOP).

Due to the high number of clear nights per year in the region, Neuraspace expects the new telescope to be even more productive than its telescope at Beja. The latter has already produced more than 300,000 measurements of space objects in orbits from LEO to GEO within the first three months of operations.