Sriharikota (Andhra Pradesh): The Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) successfully launched their GSLV-F15 rocket carrying navigation satellite NVS-02 at 6:23 am on Wednesday at Sriharikota, Andhra Pradesh, marking the Indian space agency’s 100th mission.
The mission was also the first for the space agency’s Chairman V Narayanan, who assumed office recently. It is ISRO’s maiden venture this year. As the 27.30-hour countdown concluded, the 50.9-meter tall rocket, emanating thick fumes on its tail, lifted off majestically from the second launch pad in Sriharikota.
GSLV-F15 is the 17th flight of India’s Geosynchronous Satellite Launch Vehicle (GSLV) and the 11th flight with the Indigenous cryostage. It is the 8th operational flight of GSLV with an indigenous Cryogenic stage. GSLV-F15 payload fairing is a metallic version with a diameter of 3.4 meters.
According to the space agency, the GSLV-F15 with its indigenous cryogenic stage will place the NVS-02 satellite into a Geosynchronous Transfer Orbit and the launch will take place from the Second Launch Pad (SLP) at Satish Dhawan Space Centre, SHAR.
The GSLV-F15 mission follows the GSLV-F12 mission which successfully carried navigation satellite NVS-01, the first of the second generation satellites on May 29, 2023.
The key applications of the satellite would be 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, and emergency and timing services, ISRO said.
Taking to X, Union Minister Jitendra Singh said, “100th Launch: Congratulations @isro for achieving the landmark milestone of 100th Launch from Sriharikota. It’s a privilege to be associated with the Department of Space at the historic moment of this record feat. Team #ISRO, you have once again made India proud with the successful launch of the GSLV-F15 / NVS-02 Mission.”
Navigation with Indian Constellation (NavIC) is India’s independent regional navigation satellite system designed to provide accurate Position, Velocity and Timing (PVT) service to users in India as well as the region extending about 1500 km beyond the Indian landmass, which is its primary service area, according to ISRO.
Navigation with Indian Constellation (NavIC) is India’s independent regional navigation satellite system designed to provide accurate Position, Velocity and Timing (PVT) service to users in India as well as the region extending about 1500 km beyond the Indian landmass, which is its primary service area, according to ISRO.
NavIC is providing two types of services, namely, Standard Positioning Service (SPS) and Restricted Service (RS). NavIC SPS provides a position accuracy of better than 20 m and timing accuracy better than 40 ns over the primary service Area.
NVS-02, the second satellite in the NVS series is configured with Navigation payload in L1, L5 and S bands in addition to ranging payload in C-band like its predecessor-NVS-01. It was designed, developed and integrated at U R Satellite Centre (URSC) with the support of other satellite-based work Centres.
Earlier, Nilesh Desai, Director of Space Applications Centre, ISRO, said the launch will help update India’s Regional Navigation Satellite System from four to five satellites.
“Finally, it will be put in the geostationary orbit at 36,000 kilometres and it will increase the number of satellites of our navigation constellation from 4 to 5 and that will improve the overall accuracy of the positioning which we get from this navigation satellites,” he said.
