Indian satellite successfully launched

Thursday, 10 April 2003, 19:30 IST
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BANGALORE: India's multipurpose INSAT-3A satellite was successfully launched early Thursday from Kourou in French Guiana and was responding well to commands, space agency officials here said. The satellite's response to commands from the Master Control Facility (MCF) in Hassan, 350 km from here, is a clear indication that the signal problem that had delayed its launch Wednesday had been sorted out, said sources in the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO). The telemetry signal from the satellite, launched by the Ariane-5 launch vehicle of Arianespace, was acquired by the MCF within half an hour of its launch. The satellite is currently going round the Earth with an orbital period of about 10 hours 47 minutes. "The initial health checks on the satellite indicate that the performance of the satellite is normal. First operations on the satellite were carried out by issuing commands from the MCF," ISRO announced. "The outermost panel of the stowed solar array of the satellite was oriented towards the Sun to start generating the electrical power required by the satellite. Subsequently, the Earth viewing face was oriented towards the Earth and calibration of the gyros on board the satellite was carried out," ISRO's statement said. INSAT-3A will be positioned at 93.5 deg east longitude in the geo-stationary orbit. The multipurpose satellite will provide telecommunications, television broadcasting, meteorological and search and rescue services. It carries 24 transponders -- 12 operating in the normal C-band frequency, six in extended C-band and six in the Ku-band. Nine of the 12 normal C-band transponders provide expanded coverage and the remaining three have India coverage beam. All the extended C-band as well as the Ku-band transponders have India coverage beams. INSAT-3A also carries a Ku-band beacon. The satellite also has a three-channel very high resolution radiometer with two-km resolution in the visible band and eight-km resolution in thermal infrared and water vapour bands for meteorological purposes. In addition, it carries a charge coupled device (CCD) camera, which operates in the visible and short wave infrared bands providing a spatial resolution of one km. A data relay transponder operating in UHF band is incorporated for real time hydro-meteorological data collection from unattended platforms located on land and river basins. The data can be relayed in extended C-band to a central location. INSAT-3A also carries another transponder for search and rescue as part of India's contribution to the international Satellite-Aided Search and Rescue (SASR) programme. This is the third satellite in the INSAT-3 series after INSAT-3B and INSAT-3C were launched in March 2000 and January 2002 respectively, both by Ariane.
Source: IANS
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