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TraCSS Listening Session: Conjunction Data Message (CDM) Specification

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On Wednesday, April 30, at 2:00 pm (EDT), the NOAA Office of Space Commerce (OSC) will hold a virtual Traffic Coordination System for Space (TraCSS) stakeholder listening session on the TraCSS Conjunction Data Message (CDM) specification.

The session is an opportunity for stakeholders to provide feedback on the TraCSS CDM specification, TraCSS-Spec-001-2.0, released on April 17, 2025 (provided below).

Register for this listening session via GoToWebinar.

Background:

TraCSS highly values the international standards community and based the TraCSS CDM specification on the CCSDS Conjunction Data Message recommended standard. While it is recognized the CCSDS CDM Pink Book standard will soon be published, and much of TraCSS-Spec-001 was in alignment with what is forthcoming, the message format in its pure form was somewhat restrictive, and made the parsing of information contained in the messages overly burdensome.

To overcome these limits, the draft TraCSS-Spec-001-2.0 moves away from these limitations and presents them for public feedback. Many of the updates in the draft follow the draft CCSDS CDM Pink Book standard, but several do not. Appendix 1 of the Conjunction Data Message Specification offers an explanation of these updates.

Documents associated with this listening session:

Presenters:

  • Robert Wolff – Flight Dynamics Engineer, TraCSS Engineering Branch, NOAA Office of Space Commerce
  • Dr. Dianne Poster – Senior Advisor, NOAA Office of Space Commerce (NIST Detailee)

Agenda & Public Feedback:

During the webinar, there will be 15 minutes of presentation time from OSC on the associated documents. The presentation time will be followed by 45 minutes for registered participants to provide up to three minutes of comments on the recommendations. Registered participants will need to indicate during their registration if they would like to provide oral comments.

While any feedback is welcome on the document, OSC is particularly interested in feedback regarding the following items:

  • Are there significant operational impacts to the community with the proposed data fields?
  • TraCSS is choosing to output state vectors in the EME2000 frame. Are there alternates OSC should consider as the default rather than the proposed, and why?
  • The TraCSS CDM spec does not include any comment fields. OSC is interested in feedback from the community on the operational impacts if comments are not included in a CDM.
  • In addition, and probably most importantly, is the change to the prevailing concept that a CDM is intended for object1 (often called the primary object) and that additional calculations must be performed to generate a CDM representing the same conjunction from object2’s (often called the secondary object) perspective. Instead, TraCSS will generate a single message and distribute it to both users. The community is encouraged to provide feedback on this specification and start discussion on ways to improve this specification to enable satellite operators to more easily retrieve SSA information.

Written Comments & Feedback:

In addition to oral feedback, the Office of Space Commerce is accepting written comments on these materials prior to and following this listening session. Comments may be submitted via the registration page and/or via email to tracss.commerce@noaa.gov. Written comments are requested no later than 5:00 pm (EDT), Wednesday, May 28.

No confidential business information, or otherwise sensitive or protected information, should be submitted orally or in writing. Any such information will be ignored. Except as described above, there will be no adjudication of comments received orally during the listening session or written comments received. Received oral or written comments may be summarized by OSC or its collaborators in presentations that will be presented in future webinars, workshops, or conferences that may or may not be open to the public, or through publications that may be publicly available and free of charge to readers on government or government supported websites pertaining to TraCSS.

About TraCSS Listening Sessions:

The Traffic Coordination System for Space listening sessions, hosted by the Department of Commerce’s Office of Space Commerce, are open meetings to provide the public, space operator, and SSA community with the most up-to-date information about TraCSS. These sessions are an opportunity for stakeholders to offer and provide feedback to the Office of Space Commerce regarding development of the TraCSS program.

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