Chennai: The countdown for India’s one of the longest rockets, the Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle (PSLV) with 19 satellites, began at 8:54 a.m. on Saturday (February 27), a top official from the Indian Space Research Organization (ISRO) said.
The Indian rocket with the number PSLV-C51 with the 637 kg Brazilian satellite Amazonia-1 and 18 other satellites (13 of them from the USA) is to be launched from the first launch pad in the Satish Dhawan Space Center (SDSC) in Sriharikota in Andhra Pradesh on Sunday (February 27) at 10:24 am.
“The countdown for the missile’s flight began at 8:54 a.m. for takeoff tomorrow (Sunday) at 10:24 a.m.,” ISRO chairman K.Sivan told IANS.
India’s first space mission for 2021 is one of the longest for a PSLV rocket, expected to be completed 1 hour, 55 minutes and 7 seconds after its flight.
If everything goes well with the PSLV-C51 rocket on Sunday morning, India would have hurled a total of 342 foreign satellites for a fee.
The rocket is a fully commercial rocket from NewSpace India Ltd (NSIL) with the main passenger being the Amazonia-1 satellite.
Amazonia-1 is the optical earth observation satellite of the National Institute for Space Research (INPE).
This satellite would further strengthen the existing structure by providing users with remote sensing data to monitor deforestation in the Amazon and analyze diversified agriculture in Brazilian territory, ISRO said.
The 18 passenger satellites include four from IN-SPACe (three UNITYsats from a consortium of three Indian academic institutes (Jeppiaar Institute of Technology, Sriperumbudur, GHRaisoni College of Engineering, Nagpur and Sri Shakthi Institute of Engineering and Technology, Coimbatore) and One Satish Dhawan Sat from Space Kidz India) and 14 from NSIL.
The other 14 satellites being carried on a commercial basis are Sindhu Netra, an Indian technology demonstration satellite and 13 satellites from the United States, namely SAI-1 NanoConnect-2, a technology demonstration satellite and 12 SpaceBees satellites for bidirectional satellite communication and data relaying .
For the third time, ISRO will use the DL variant of the PSLV rocket, which has two buckle-up booster motors.
This variant of the rocket was used to launch the Microsat R satellite into orbit for the first time on January 24, 2019.
The PSLV is a four-stage solid and liquid fuel rocket, alternatively equipped with six booster motors attached to the first stage for increased thrust during the first few moments of flight.
The PSLV-C51 mission is one of the longest.
The 19 satellites will be launched into Sun Synchronous Orbit over a period of 1 hour, 55 minutes and 7 seconds.
During the flight, the engine of the fourth stage of the rocket is switched off and restarted several times. The first will be 16 minutes after the flight begins.
Seventeen minutes after its flight, the rocket will launch the Brazilian Amazonia-1 satellite.
The rocket motor is restarted for about nine seconds for a little more than an hour’s flight before it is switched off again.
After 1 hour, 49 minutes and 52 seconds, the rocket motor is reignited for eight seconds, after which the 18 piggyback satellites are put into orbit.
Live television
