Getting a payload off the launchpad is only the first step in a complex chain of engineering and mission planning required to explore space. On Friday at 2:30 PM, the Hilton 212–214 hosted “Space Flight Operations 101,” a practical walkthrough of what it takes to fly in space. The panel featured Georgia Tech PhD students Bec Palmer, who specializes in space sustainability, and Mason Starr, alongside Teresa Spinelli, a Georgia Tech alumna and Mission Director for the Cygnus spacecraft.
Palmer opened the session by outlining the foundational syllabus of spaceflight: Mission Design, Spacecraft Design, and Mission Operations.
Mission Design begins with defining the “what” and the “where.” Using a mock lunar surface mission as an example, Palmer explained that destination sets initial constraints, dictating flight trajectories and launch windows. From there, teams define the Concept of Operations (ConOps), which she defined as the “how.”
Mission profiles dictate the entire lifecycle: a Mars journey, for example, demands a long cruising phase followed by Entry, Descent, and Landing (EDL) before primary and secondary planetary surface operations begin. A critical element of early planning is calculating the Delta-V budget, the total velocity change required to execute maneuvers. Palmer explained the Delta-V budget as the amount of fuel you need to complete the mission. The bigger the rocket, the more fuel you need to launch.
The discussion then moved to Spacecraft Design and managing key subsystems. Power generation takes priority immediately after launch. Spinelli pointed out that while some vehicles must reorient their entire structure to face the sun, future designs will utilize steerable arrays. However, sunlight brings intense thermal challenges. We think of space as cold, but it’s “actually just empty. Starr noted that the absence of air means there is no medium to conduct heat away, requiring a delicate balance of internal heaters and external radiators. High “beta angles”—extended exposure to sunlight—can overheat systems, prompting techniques like the “BBQ roll,” where a craft slowly rotates in orbit so one side vents heat into the void while the other faces heat from Earth’s atmosphere. Other crucial subsystems include attitude and orbit control where we use star trackers or GPS to maintain orientation. Another subsystem is propulsion where they discussed emerging electric and green propulsion systems capable of low, continuous thrust.
The final phase, Mission Operations, bridges the gap between hardware and human decision-making. The primary mandate for operators is keeping the spacecraft healthy while achieving scientific goals. “Safety is the number one goal in human spaceflight,” Spinelli emphasized, describing the delicate balance between crew well-being and strict mission timelines (also due to crew safety). Spinelli manages a core team of around 65 controllers that scales up to 30 people actively staffing the floor during critical approaches to the International Space Station, while dropping to on-call automated alerts during quiet transit windows.
Above all, the panelists emphasized that communication remains the single most critical subsystem on any vehicle. “Without a radio you can’t talk to it, and if you can’t, what good is it?” Starr noted. Whether relying on tracking constellations like Tracking and Data Relay Satellite (TDRS), or planning around long latency delays across deep space, mission success ultimately relies on keeping lines of contact open from Earth to the spacecraft.
