SSAPy - Space Situational Awareness for Python

Meyers, Joshua E.; Schneider, Michael D.; Ebert, Julia T.; Schlafly, Edward F.; Yeager, Travis; Perloff, Alexx; Merl, Daniel; Lifset, Noah; Bernstein, Jason; Dawson, William A.; Golovich, Nathan; Higgins, Denvir; McGill, Peter; Miller, Caleb; Pruett, Kerianne

doi:10.21105/joss.08147

SSAPy - Space Situational Awareness for Python

Journal Article · Mon Jul 28 00:00:00 EDT 2025 · Journal of Open Source Software

DOI:https://doi.org/10.21105/joss.08147· OSTI ID:2575226

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SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory (SLAC), Menlo Park, CA (United States); Stanford Univ., CA (United States). Kavli Institute for Particle Astrophysics & Cosmology
Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL), Livermore, CA (United States)
Fleet Robotics, Somerville, MA (United States)
Space Telescope Science Institute, Baltimore, MD (United States)
University of Texas, Austin, TX (United States)

SSAPy is a fast and flexible orbit modeling and analysis tool for orbits spanning from low-Earth into the cislunar regime. Orbits can be flexibly specified from common input formats such as Keplerian elements or two-line element (TLE) data files. SSAPy allows users to model satellites and specify parameters such as satellite area, mass, and drag coefficients. SSAPy includes a customizable force-propagation with a range of Earth, Lunar, radiation, atmospheric, and maneuvering models. SSAPy makes use of various community integration methods and can calculate time-evolved orbital quantities, including satellite magnitudes and state vectors. Users can specify various space- and ground-based observation models with support for multiple coordinate and reference frames. SSAPy also supports orbit analysis and propagation methods such as multiple hypothesis tracking and has built-in uncertainty quantification. The majority of SSAPy’s methods are vectorized and parallelizable, allowing for effective use of high-performance computer (HPC) systems. Finally, SSAPy has plotting functionality, allowing users to visualize orbits and trajectories. Examples are shown in Figure 1 and Figure 2.

Research Organization:: Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL), Livermore, CA (United States)

Sponsoring Organization:: USDOE National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA); USDOE Laboratory Directed Research and Development (LDRD) Program

Grant/Contract Number:: AC52-07NA27344

OSTI ID:: 2575226

Report Number(s):: LLNL--JRNL-871602

Journal Information:: Journal of Open Source Software, Journal Name: Journal of Open Source Software Journal Issue: 111 Vol. 10; ISSN 2475-9066

Publisher:: Open Source Initiative - NumFOCUSCopyright Statement

Country of Publication:: United States

Language:: English

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