Human Factors for Space Operators-Leveraging Aviation Safety Frameworks for Enhanced Orbital Domain Resilience

By Ruth Stilwell, DPA , Kyle Quakenbush , John Giles , Nathaniel Dailey

This paper examines the human factors parallels between Space Domain Awareness (SDA) occupations and other continuous (24/7/365) safety-critical services, offering insights into safety management successes and best practices. It draws on NASA’s System-Wide Safety program in aviation, which addresses scaling safety management from human-centric operations to a digitally transformed, automation-integrated infrastructure. These findings are highly relevant to the evolving space domain, particularly as commercial space operations reshape orbital management and ground-based oversight.

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