India to ferry heaviest foreign satellite in August
29 April 2012 6:23 PM GMT
India will ferry two foreign satellites - French and Japanese - aboard its Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle (PSLV-C21) rocket in August this year for a price, said a senior official.
'The next rocket launch will be in August. We will be sending our PSLV rocket with French satellite SPOT 6 (800 kg) and a small Japanese satellite weighing around 15 kg. Though the rocket is called PSLV-C21 it will go before PSLV-C20,' said P S Veeraraghavan, director, Vikram Sarabhai Space Centre (VSSC).
The Thiruvananthapuram-based VSCC is part of India's space agency Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO).
ISRO's commercial arm Antrix Corporation Limited (Antrix) has entered into a commercial Launch Services Agreement with Astrium SAS, a company under EADS, France for launching SPOT-6, an advanced remote sensing satellite.
The 800 kg SPOT-6 built by Astrium SAS will be the heaviest third party payload that ISRO will carry after the 350 kg Italian satellite Agile in 2007.
As the total luggage will be around 815 kg, ISRO will use its Core Alone variant of PSLV (rocket without its six strap-on motors).
The mission will take ISRO's total tally of ferrying foreign satellites to 29.
ISRO has been carrying foreign satellites since 1999 initially as add-on luggage to its own satellites. It was with the Agile satellite that it started flying full commercial rockets.
According to Veeraraghavan, the space agency would launch the SARAL satellite - an Indo-French initiative - using PSLV-C20 rocket after the August launch.
'The next rocket launch will be in August. We will be sending our PSLV rocket with French satellite SPOT 6 (800 kg) and a small Japanese satellite weighing around 15 kg. Though the rocket is called PSLV-C21 it will go before PSLV-C20,' said P S Veeraraghavan, director, Vikram Sarabhai Space Centre (VSSC).
The Thiruvananthapuram-based VSCC is part of India's space agency Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO).
ISRO's commercial arm Antrix Corporation Limited (Antrix) has entered into a commercial Launch Services Agreement with Astrium SAS, a company under EADS, France for launching SPOT-6, an advanced remote sensing satellite.
The 800 kg SPOT-6 built by Astrium SAS will be the heaviest third party payload that ISRO will carry after the 350 kg Italian satellite Agile in 2007.
As the total luggage will be around 815 kg, ISRO will use its Core Alone variant of PSLV (rocket without its six strap-on motors).
The mission will take ISRO's total tally of ferrying foreign satellites to 29.
ISRO has been carrying foreign satellites since 1999 initially as add-on luggage to its own satellites. It was with the Agile satellite that it started flying full commercial rockets.
According to Veeraraghavan, the space agency would launch the SARAL satellite - an Indo-French initiative - using PSLV-C20 rocket after the August launch.
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