The event system is where the power and flexibility of the Portable Space Engine lies. They are evaluated as functions called by the space object's DB object, often with arguments, and the results are discarded. So what use are they? Using side-effect functions and spacecall's, you can do pretty much anything with events.
For example, an automated space station might have an EV_NEW_CONTACT attribute defined on it that calls the owner_number spacecall to determine if the new contact is an enemy ship. If it is, it might trigger routines to cause the station to raise an alert, or even attack.
The links below lead to a complete list of events, and the arguments
that are passed to them.
III.1 Contact Events
III.2 Docking, Undocking, Landing, Laucnhing
and Orbiting