ISRO launched its heaviest commercial mission at 9.58pm Friday night.
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Since 1999 until date, India has launched forty satellites of different nations with its PSLV rocket and the profitable launch of the 5 British satellites would take the tally to forty five. The 91 kg CBNT-1 is an optical Earth Observation technology demonstration micro satellite built by the SSTL.
So far, Antrix has provided launch services on-board PSLV for 40 customers satellites from 19 countries.
ISRO Public Relations Director, Devi Prasad Karnik told AIR that the countdown process is in smooth progression and the filling up of liquid fuels in its fourth and second stages have been completed.
“With the overall lift-off mass of the five satellites amounting to about 1440 kg, this mission becomes the heaviest commercial mission ever undertaken by Antrix/ISRO”, read the website.
The three DMC3 satellites, each weighing 447 kg, would be launched into a 647 km Sun-Synchronous Orbit (SSO) using the high-end version of PSLV (PSLV-XL).
For the onlookers, the rocket looked like an inverted flare/torch as it lit up the night sky amidst the cheers of the ISRO officials and the media team assembled at the rocket port here.
Five British satellites being encapsulated in the payload fairing for the PSLV-C28 mission. 140 crore is a four-stage/engine rocket with six strap-on motors for additional thrust during the initial phase of the flight.
At the rocket mission control room, Indian space scientists at ISRO were glued to their computer screens watching the rocket escaping the earth’s gravitational pull.
In its 30th flight, the PSLV-C28, with 29 successive successful missions, would launch three identical DMC3 optical earth observation satellites built by Surrey Satellite Technology Limited (SSTL), United Kingdom (UK). The 7 kg De-orbitSail from Surrey Space Centre, is an experimental nano satellite for demonstration of large thin membrane sail and drag deorbiting using this sail.
Three of the satellites to be launched on Friday – DMC3-1, DMC3-2 and DMC3-3 – are mini-satellites designed for Earth observations.
This is second launch by the ISRO in 2015 with the previous one being launch navigation satellite-IRNSS-1D earlier in March.
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The smallest of the five PSLV-C28 passengers is the De-orbitSail nanosatellite, weighing just 15 lbs.
