Aerospace and Electronic Systems Magazine January 2018 - 21

Hussein, Silva-Martinez, and Wilson
matter of time before Earth is faced with a real cosmic threat, and
if deflection efforts fail, human survival will depend on the level
of impact-disaster preparedness. This strategy consists of dealing
with a threat before impact through evacuation and sheltering, and
recovery after the impact. A proper disaster preparedness strategy
specific to asteroids and comets can reduce loss of life and facilitate a quicker recovery. The following list provides set of recommendations that can contribute to a successful evacuation and recovery plan:
C

Each government shall provide accurate information regarding the impact characteristics, its timeline, and status of mitigation for the population to know in advance how to respond
to the threat. Each country needs to include NEOs into the
conversation about a natural disaster, and local authorities in
the threatened area need to develop an evacuation route and
inform all citizens to optimize the usage of existing transportation capacity.
More funding needs to be allocated for research into damage assessment and impact computations to have a realistic
idea of impact effects on infrastructure and environment in
the short and long-term. Remote sensing with specific applications in disaster and evacuation management needs to
be further developed.
The energy distribution should be kept on until the final hour
of the impact. In case a full evacuation is necessary, governments need to plan in advance when to shut down nuclear
power plants.
Each government should create a National Shelter Database
specifying all types of shelters that can be used in case of
impact and give further information regarding location and
accessibility. Coordinating the allocation of people into the
proposed hardened shelters should be done by the local authorities responsible for the structures in their area.
A global seed bank and smaller shelters should be developed
around the world to provide accommodation for all species
of plants and animals endangered by an impact.
A post-impact recovery strategy needs to be developed to
minimize collateral damage and begin reconstruction as
soon as possible.

CONCLUSIONS
The Planetary Defense Team Project (READI Project) organized
by the International Space University Space Studies Program used
the Integrated Product Process Development methodology to manage the project using a systems engineering approach. In Phase
I, the team started by defining five main elements for planetary
defense based on an extensive literature review, which are: detection and tracking, deflection techniques, global collaboration, outreach and education, and evacuation and recovery. We categorized
our ideas with the aid of management planning tools like a mind
map and Microsoft Project, and also using a short version of the
house of quality or what's and how's to understand and derive the
JANUARY 2018

stakeholders' requirements. We then evaluated our alternatives using functional and operational architectures along with morphological matrices. The final proposed solutions or the focused points
for each area were decided using a risk matrix analysis comparing
the level of risk versus the time of impact; an asteroid or comet
threat with a short warning period (one-two years) from detection.
In phase 2, we further developed each group's proposed solutions,
and validated and verified the requirements of the compliant matrix. As it should be required for any systems of systems project,
we implemented a multidisciplinary approach using available resources on campus with the aid of visiting experts, as well as ISU
department chairs in the areas of space science, space engineering,
space applications, space policy, economics, and law, space management and business, space humanities, and human performance
in space. We then defined our initial threat conditions, deciding
to use a comet for our scenario, as there are few studies on comet
threats, whereas asteroids have been looked at quite extensively.
The management of projects can be very challenging, but having an effective plan, motivated people, and resources, they can be
accomplished. Given the complexity of this topic, the time constraints, and the diversity of professional and cultural backgrounds,
we proved that this could be successfully done. We hope the case
study where project management was applied to planetary defense
can be of use to the management of other Research and Development and engineering projects.

ACKNOWLEDGMENT
The authors would like to thank their fellow ISU SSP15 Planetary Defense team members for the work they accomplished on
the Project: Anushree Soni, Bora Aliaj, Carlos M. Entrena Utrilla,
Chanwoo Lee, Doron Shterman, Fernando González, Hugh Byrne,
Idriss Sisaid, James McCreight, Jessica Reinert, Jonathan Faull,
Lars Hoving, Laura Bettiol, Louis Neophytou, Marianne Girard,
Naama Glauber, Nicholas Strzalkowski, Nikola Schmidt, Oshri
Rozenheck, Parker Stratton, Rémi Gourdon, Shajiha Meeran,
Shangrong Ouyang, Shitao Ji, Shrrirup Nambiar, Susanne Peters,
Tihomir Dimitrov, Toby Call, Umang Parikh, Yunjun Yang, Yuxian
Jia, and Zheng Fang. We would also like to thank our chair Madhu
Thangavelu for coordinating the Planetary Defense team project,
along with our teaching associate Thomas Wilson and our advisor
Jim Burke. Finally, we give our thanks to those who have read our
paper [20] and might have an interest in reading our complete project report [7], executive summary [8], our recent papers in the 66th
International Astronautical Congress 2015 (IAC 2015) [9] in the
American Geophysical Union [10], in the 2016 IEEE Aerospace
Conference [11], and in Acta Astronautica journal [12].

REFERENCES
[1]
[2]
[3]

IEEE A&E SYSTEMS MAGAZINE

Popova, O. P., et al. Chelyabinsk airburst, damage assessment, meteorite recovery and characterization. Science, Vol. 342, (2013).
Schrage, D. Aerospace systems engineering presentations, 2011. [Online] Available: https://t-square.gatech.edu/portal.
Kreitner, R., and Kinicki, A. Organizational Behavior (8th ed.). New
York, USA: McGraw-Hill, 2008.

https://t-square.gatech.edu/portal

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of Aerospace and Electronic Systems Magazine January 2018