EARTH ORIENTED SAFE MODE DESIGN BASED ON THE EADS ASTRIUM CESS

A general concept for an earth-oriented safe mode for low earth orbiting satellites is proposed. It is mainly based on earth vector information provided by the Astrium Coarse Earth and Sun Sensor (CESS) and has been successfully used on several earth observation missions. Its application is not restricted to certain orbit properties and does not depend on the knowledge of position, velocity or time.