Simulation of the Separation of a Manned Spacecraft from Large Orbital Space Stations

Ensuring the safety of the crewmembers is the key element in any manned space program. When a manned spacecraft undocks and departs the space station, the safety is primarily understood as a collision-free process. In this paper, an approach to the safety evaluation of manned spacecraft separation from large-sized orbital stations is considered. Equations are presented that fully describe the dynamics and kinematics of the separated space objects as a system of rigid bodies performing a relative motion under the influence of power factors. The simulation results of the Soyuz spacecraft separation from the International Space Station in emergency cases caused by certain vehicle engines failures are presented. A conclusion is made about the workability of this approach to identify critical failures and the restrictions that they impose on the possible configuration of the station before spacecraft undocking.

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