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ISRO starts countdown for historic 100th mission from Sriharikota | What is it about?
The launch of a Navigation satellite onboard a GSLV rocket, which will also be the first mission for ISRO Chairman V Narayanan, will take place on Wednesday.
The countdown for the Indian Space Research Organisation’s (ISRO) historic 100th mission from the Satish Dawan Space Centre in Andhra Pradesh's Sriharikota began on Tuesday, sources cited in a news agency PTI report said.
The launch of a Navigation satellite onboard a GSLV rocket, which will also be the first mission under new ISRO Chairman V Narayanan, will take place on Wednesday morning. Narayanan took office on January 13.
The Geosynchronous Satellite Launch Vehicle (GSLV) with indigenous Cryogenic upper stage in its 17th flight, carrying the navigation satellite NVS-02 is scheduled for lift-off at 6.23 am on January 29. The countdown began 27 hours before the lift off time.
"The 27.30 hour countdown commenced at 02.53 am on Tuesday," PTI reported quoting sources.
The 50.9 metre tall GSLV-F15 follows the GSLV-F12 mission, which successfully carried navigation satellite NVS-01, the first of the second generation satellite series almost two years ago, on May 29, 2023.
What is ISRO's 100th mission about?
The navigation satellite NVS-02, that ISRO is launching in its historic 100th mission from the Satish Dhawan Space Centre on Wednesday, is the second in the series of the Navigation with Indian Constellation (NavIC) aimed to provide accurate position, velocity and timing to users in the Indian sub-continent as well as to regions about 1,500 km beyond the Indian land mass.
NavIC comprises five second generation satellites--NVS-01/02/03/04/05 envisaged to augment NavIC base layer constellation with enhanced features for ensuring continuity of services.
The NVS-02 satellite designed and developed by the U R Satellite Centre weighs about 2,250 kg. It has navigation payload in L1, L5 and S bands in addition to ranging payload in C-band like its predecessor NVS-01.
According to ISRO, the key applications the satellite would be used for are terrestrial, aerial and maritime navigation, precision agriculture, fleet management, location based services in mobile devices, orbit determination for satellites, Internet-of-Things (IoT) based applications, emergency and timing services.
