Welcome to the Space Surveillance and Tracking – Forecast of geomagnetic and solar indices for drag calculation service

Artist's view of Swarm

The service "Space Surveillance and Tracking – Forecast of geomagnetic and solar indices for drag calculation" provides forecast of geomagnetic and solar indices for drag calculation. The service aims to provide a single, user-friendly access point via the ESA SWE Portal to nowcast and forecast indices needed for atmospheric modelling in support of atmospheric drag calculation.

This service addresses the needs of space surveillance and tracking users. This includes primarily the users of surveillance and tracking centre(s), stations and services, spacecraft operators (also spacecraft operators service domain), collision warning services and re-entry risk assessment services.

This service is implemented through a combination of products, tools and alerts which can be found through the following sections along with expert support provided by the teams constituting the SWE Network. Should you require further guidance in the use of this service, or have specific questions about any aspects of the service presented here, don't hesitate to contact the Helpdesk.

The service is implemented through the following set of assets:

• Nowcast and Forecast of Geomagnetic and Solar Activity Indices for SST users (FORIND) provided by the Romanian Institute of Space Science (ISS);
• Space Weather bulletin of the Solar Influences Data Analysis Center (SIDC) provided by the Royal Observatory of Belgium (ROB);
• Forecast of geomagnetic index provided by the Swedish Institute of Space Physics (IRF Lund);
• COMESEP alert of geomagnetic storm provided by the Royal Belgian Institute for Space Aeronomy (BIRA-IASB);
• Geomagnetic storm alert and prediction provided by Universidad de Alcalá (UAH);
• Forecast of geomagnetic indices provided by the British Geological Survey (BGS).

This service page is curated by the ESC Ionospheric Weather.  For further information, please contact SSCC Helpdesk. 

Introduction

This service provides forecast of geomagnetic and solar indices for drag calculation. The service goal is to provide access to forecasts of those geomagnetic and solar indices which are needed to enable computation of future thermospheric drag on satellites. The solar activity indices are derived from Sunspot number, Solar Microwave (F10.7), Solar EUV, Solar FUV and Solar X-ray data. The geomagnetic indices are derived from geomagnetic field measurements.

Application

These services are expected to be used by a variety of users including:

• Academics investigating and modelling solar and geomagnetic conditions
• Commercial satellite operators
• ESA/ESOC/S2P SST segment/Space Debris Office and Flight Dynamics
• Third party service providers

The key anticipated areas of usage are:

• Automated services needing up to date indices forecasts
• Analysts of solar and geomagnetic phenomena
• Services to provide forecasts of atmospheric neutral density

Key Products

Solar Activity indices, forecast

• International Sunspot number
• Solar Microwave Index (F10.7)

Geomagnetic indices, forecast

• Geomagnetic Indices Kp and K
• Geomagnetic Indices Ap and A
• Geomagnetic Index Dst

The service is implemented through the following set of assets:

FORIND provides nowcasts and forecasts of solar and geomagnetic indices needed for atmospheric modelling in support of atmospheric drag calculation. These indices are stored on a dedicated FORIND database and can be retrieved, in a custom tailored and homogenous form, via a web page or a REST interface in CSV and JSON formats or visualized in PNG format.

ROB/SIDC forecasts solar radio flux F10.7.

IRF provides a forecast of geomagnetic indices: Kp, Dst and dB/dt.

COMESEP provides forecasts of geomagnetic storms.

UAH provides geomagnetic storm alert and prediction.

Auxiliary Information

This section provides links to web pages or resources that are not part of the ESA Space Weather Network or esa.int domain.  These sites are not under ESA control and therefore ESA is not responsible for any of the information or links that you may find there. 

Reference documents

• ECSS-E-ST-10-04C Rev.1 Space environment (15 June 2020)

Contact

For further information, please contact SSCC Helpdesk.