The Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) on Wednesday successfully launched the country’s own advanced spy satellite RISAT-2BR1 and nine foreign satellites from the Sriharikota rocket port in Andhra Pradesh.
RISAT-2BR1 and the nine foreign satellites were successfully placed in their designated orbits by PSLV-C48.
India’s Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle PSLV-C48 rocket, on its 50th mission, blasted off from the Satish Dhawan Space Centre carrying the 628 Kg RISAT-2BR1 — a radar imaging earth observation satellite — and nine foreign satellites from four countries.
The foreign satellites belong to the US (multi-mission Lemur-4 satellites, technology demonstration Tyvak-0129, earth imaging 1HOPSAT), Israel (remote sensing Duchifat-3), Italy (search and rescue Tyvak-0092) and Japan (QPS-SAR- radar imaging earth observation satellite).
Today’s launch marks a significant milestone for the space agency as it would be the 50th flight of the PSLV and also the 75th vehicle mission from Sriharikota. RISAT-2BR1, the radar imaging earth observation satellite is meant for applications in various fields like agriculture, forestry and disaster management support.
The mission life of RISAT2-BR1 is five years. RISAT-2BR1 follows the successful launch of RISAT-2B on May 22.
Till date, the ISRO has put into orbit 310 foreign satellites. With today’s mission turning successful, the number has gone up to 319.
On November 27, the ISRO successfully launched PSLV-C47 carrying Cartosat-3 spacecraft and 13 nanosatellites from Satish Dhawan Space Centre at Sriharikota.