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INSAT 3-A launched

Bangalore, April 10
In a textbook launch, India’s advanced multipurpose satellite INSAT-3A was successfully hurled into space today after a 24-hour delay, on a mission expected to give a big push to the country’s space-based broadcasting, communication and weather monitoring services.

The indigenously built INSAT-3A, the country’s biggest spacecraft with a 12-year mission life, was hurled into space by European rocket Ariane-5 from the French Guyanese spaceport of Kourou in South America.

The 160th flight of Ariane, carrying Indian Space Research Organisation’s 2,958 kg INSAT-3A and GALAXY-XII of PanAmSat, lifted off majestically at 4.22 a.m. IST and injected the Indian satellite into space 30 minutes later.

The INSAT-3A launch was put off for a day yesterday after ISRO scientists observed during final checks that the signal strength from one of the two telemetry transmitters was less than normal. ISRO experts at Kourou and in India cleared the spacecraft for launch after extensive simulations and careful analysis later yesterday.

As INSAT-3A was successfully launched — an event telecast live by Doordarshan — a top ISRO team at the launch site, including its Chairman K. Kasturirangan, INSAT-3A Project Director R.K. Rajangam and ISRO Satellite Centre Director P.S. Goel, expressed joy. “It was a wonderful achievement. A very eventful flight of Ariane-5. Spectacular and more importantly, technologically precise” a beaming Kasturirangan said in post-launch comments.

INSAT-3A represents an important step in creating augmenting infrastructure in India for space-based broadcasting, communication and meteorology, Mr Kasturirangan said. PTI