Radar Imaging Satellite is designed to provide high quality images in all weather
New Delhi:
Indian Space Research Organization (ISRO) launched a Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle with two small co-passenger satellites at 05.59 am today from the first launch pad of the Satish Dhawan Space Center in Sriharikota, Andhra Pradesh.
This was ISRO’s first launch mission of 2020, whose 25-hour countdown began yesterday.
City Headquarters ISRO said in a tweet, “PSLV-C52/EOS-04 Mission: The 25 hrs 30 mins countdown process for launch has begun at 04:29 hrs today.”
The launch vehicle is designed to orbit the Earth observation satellite EOS-04, weighing 1,710 kg, in a 529 km Sun-synchronous polar orbit.
EOS-04 is a radar imaging satellite designed to provide high quality images in all weather conditions for applications such as agriculture, forestry and plantation, soil moisture and hydrology, and flood mapping.
The two small co-passenger satellites include a student satellite (INSPIREsat-1) of the Indian Institute of Space Science and Technology (IIST) in collaboration with the Laboratory of Atmospheric and Space Physics at the University of Colorado at Boulder. NTU, Singapore and NCU, Taiwan also contribute in this.
The satellite has two scientific payloads intended to improve understanding of ionosphere dynamics and the Sun’s coronal heating processes.
The other is a Technology Demonstrator Satellite (INS-2TD) of ISRO, a precursor to the India-Bhutan Joint Satellite (INS-2B). By having a thermal imaging camera as its payload, the satellite takes advantage of the estimation of land surface temperature, water surface temperature of wetlands or lakes, vegetation (crops and forests) and thermal inertia (day and night).
This is the 54th flight of PSLV and the 23rd mission using PSLV-XL configuration with 6 PSOM-XL (strap-on motors).
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