India launched a
closely-guarded Israeli-built radar spy satellite Monday to begin gathering
valuable intelligence data from a 342-mile-high perch above the planet,
regardless of lighting and weather conditions.
The country's 15th Polar
Satellite Launch Vehicle ignited at 0115 GMT and leapt from the Second Launch
Pad at the Satish Dhawan Space Center on India's east coast. Liftoff of the
144-foot-tall rocket was at 6:45 a.m. local time.
The Indian Space Research
Organization, which oversaw
the launch, declared the flight a success on its Web site.
The
PSLV was carrying a secretive satellite fitted with a dish-like radar antenna
designed to see through darkness, clouds and camouflage, Spaceflight Now
reported Saturday.
The satellite, named RISAT
2, weighs about 660 pounds at launch and was built by Israel Aerospace
Industries. It is designed for an orbit with an altitude of about 342 miles and
inclined 41 degrees to the equator.
Radars transmit beams
toward Earth and measure the reflected signals to create detailed images of
objects on the ground.
"RISAT 2 is a radar
imaging satellite with all-weather capability to take images of the
Earth," ISRO said in a document on its Web site. "This satellite will
enhance ISRO's capability for disaster management applications."
But Indian news agencies
have reported RISAT 2 will be used by the military.
RISAT 2 is similar to
Israel's TECSAR satellite launched by another PSLV rocket last year. Both
satellites look identical in available public imagery, have the same launch
mass, and will operate in comparable orbits.
The new satellite provides
an important new capability for Indian intelligence services. Previous Indian
satellites, including a high-resolution observer launched last April, carried
optical imaging sensors that were hampered by darkness and bad weather
conditions on the ground.
For more information on
RISAT 2, see our preview
story.
Monday's launch also hauled
into space a small 84-pound educational satellite called ANUSAT.
ANUSAT will demonstrate
technologies related to message store-and-forward operations, according to ISRO.
The craft was built by
students at Anna University, a leading engineering institution in India.
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