ISRO launches record 104 satellites
The story of Indian Space Research Organisation (Isro) is amazing journey — from 1981 when they were struggling to transport a satellite in bullock cart to creating world record now by launching 104 satellites. The launch of more than 100 nanosatellites on a single rocket shows Isro’s domination in space. launch of 104 satellites on Wednesday from Satish Dhawan Space Centre at Sriharikota has been watched by the world over with a gleam of appreciation.
“This is a great moment for each and every one of us. Today we have created history,” said project director B Jayakumar.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi also tweeted his congratulations on the launch by the state-run Isro. “This remarkable feat by Isro is yet another proud moment for our space scientific community and the nation,” he said, adding “India salutes our scientists.”
Isro launched the PSlV-C37 rocket with 104 nanosatellites on board the craft. After Mangalyaan this is one more feather in Isro’s cap and PSlV-C37 carried aboard the CartoSat-2D satellite, as well as 103 nano-satellites from various countries as part of Antrix Corporation limited’s deals with the operators of these satellites.
Antrix is Isro’s commercial division and provides entities the option to get their satellites in space onboard the Isro rockets.
Apart from CartoSat-2D and INS-1A built by Isro, carried Flock-3p — Plant labs, United States of America, lemur-2 — Spire Global, United States of America, Al-Farabi-1 — Al-Farabi Kazakh National University,
Kazakhstan, BGUSat-Ben Gurion University, Israel, Nayif-1 — Emirates Institution for Advanced Science and Technology (EIAST), UAE, DIDO-2-SpacePharma, Israel and Switzerland PEASS-PEASS Consortium, Netherlands, Germany, Belgium, and Israel apart from other nanosatellites.
CartoSat-2D is the fifth in the series of CartoSat-2 remote-sensing satellites that capture and send panchromatic and multispectral images of India from space. These images can be used to monitor the coastal land use, urban and rural planning, road networks and water distribution, and to identify natural and man-made features. Weighing 714 kilograms, Isro’s CartoSat-2D is the heaviest satellite onboard the PSlV-C37 and accounts for more than half the 1,377-kilogram payload of the rocket.
Isro Nanosatellite-1A is an 8.4-kilogram research satellite that will stay operational for six months, and carry two science payloads. One is the Surface BRDF Radiometer (SBR) payload that can be used measure the Bidirectional Reflectance Distribution Function (BRDF) of targets on the Earth’s surface and will be able to take readings of the sunlight reflected off different surface features. The other is the Single Event Upset Monitor (SEUM), which can be used to track Single Event Upsets that happen due to high energy radiation in space environment in Commercial, Off-the-Shelf (COTS) electronic components.
Isro’s Nanosatellite-1B aboard the new PSlV-C37 rocket is also a modular satellite similar to the INS-1B, but weighs 9.7 kilogram. It is expected to remain operational for 6-12 months and also carries two science payloads: the Earth Exosphere lyman Alpha Analyser (EElA) and Origami Camera payload from ISRO’s Space Application Centre (SAC). EElA keeps track of terrestrial exospheric line-of-sight neutral atomic hydrogen lyman Alpha flux and can give an estimate for the interplanetary hydrogen lyman Alpha background flux by means of deep space observations. The Origami Camera, on the other hand, is a remote sensing colour camera that can take high-resolution pictures of the Earth with a small package.