The European Space Agency's mission to rendezvous space probe Giotto with Halley's comet required the establishment of a complex ground-station support system for the mission-control team. To meet this goal, ESA built a telemetry, tracking, and command system involving new technologies and approaches. Instrumental to the system is a network of radio-telescope ground stations which perform various primary and back-up telecommunication functions. Giotto's antenna subsystem provides the RF link between spacecraft and ground stations. Three antennas are mounted on the spacecraft: one high-gain antenna (HGA), and two low-gain antennas. Through the telemetry, tracking, and command system, daily spacecraft altitude maneuvers were performed to maintain radio contact with Earth stations.
Giotto pioneers Halley's comet with space telemetry and tracking system
Giotto-Sonde erforscht den Halley-Komet mit Hilfe eines Raum-Telemetrie- und Zielverfolgungssystems
InTech ; 34 , 1 ; 25-28
1987
4 Seiten, 3 Bilder, 1 Tabelle
Article (Journal)
English
The Giotto mission to Halley's comet
Elsevier | 1983
|Giotto: A Mission to Halley's Comet
NTIS | 1980
|Space Missions to Halley's Comet
NTIS | 1986
|Space missions to Halley's comet
Elsevier | 1984
Thermal modeling of Halley's Comet
NTRS | 1984
|