Last year saw the largest number of rocket launches, the largest mass to orbit ever achieved, and a wide variety of space missions by a growing number of countries and companies.

In short, it’s getting busy up there. So how can we keep ourselves safe and free from collision and conflict?

Robin Dickey is a space policy and strategy analyst at The Aerospace Corporation’s Center for Space Policy and Strategy. She focuses on national security, space, geopolitics, and international relations. She recently published a paper titled “(Space) Ships Passing in the Night: Translating Maritime Rules of the Road for the Space Domain” which sheds light on this situation.

"Some of these maritime domain principals help make it easier to make the interactions between different satellites and different satellite operators more regular, more predictable, less risky, and all of those things can help ensure in the long term that commerce in space is able to flourish," Dickey said.

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