Countdown for launch of India’s ‘eye in the sky’ satellite begins

The INSPIREsat-1 is a student satellite from Indian Institute of Space Science & Technology (11ST) in association with Laboratory of Atmospheric & Space Physics at University of Colorado, USA. The other contributors are NTU, Singapore and NCU, Taiwan.The satellite carries two scientific payloads to improve the understanding of ionosphere dynamics and the sun’s coronal heating process.The technology demonstrator satellite (INS-2TD) from ISRO, which is a precursor to India-Bhutan Joint Satellite (INS-2B) carries a thermal imaging camera to assess land/water surface temperature of wetlands/lakes, delineation of vegetation (crops/forests) and day/night thermal inertia.The RISAT-1A flight will be followed by the launch of three satellites – OCEANSAT-3, INS-2B, ANAND- by PSLV-C53 in March and Micro SAT by the newly developed small rocket Small Satellite Launch Vehicle (SSLV) in April.Further, the launch of four ton communication satellite GSAT-24 is also scheduled during the first quarter of this year using Ariane 5 rocket owned by Arianespace.



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