A Research on the Adaptability of Collision Criterion and

With the rising number of space debris, people pay more and more attention to the space debris collision avoidance system (SDCAS). In the early 1990s, the BOX method is commonly used as a collision criterion to decide whether the avoiding maneuver is necessary for a spacecraft. But this method has low practicability, so the method of collision probability is developed. This method takes the relative distance and other geometrical parameters at the en time of two space objects into consideration. However, the mathematical model of this collision criterion depends highly on the orbit errors, so it may lead to some inaccurate results. In this paper, the rendezvous of two orbits are sim, and the errors are considered, then the relative distance at the moment of their closest approach and the collision probability are calculated. The re indicate that the covariance of position errors plays an indispensable role in measuring the risk of collision. When the precision of orbit prediction is not very good, it is better to combine the BOX method and the collision probability method in the SDCAS.